Eyes of Fire Read Online Free PDF Page B

partner in all things.
    Her life and the island were damn near perfect.
    Except that now Adam was back.
    She stared at the house, inwardly swearing and breathing deeply to calm herself. She heard voices, guests returning to their rooms. She closed her eyes, hoping she was concealed by the healthy tangle of orchids. The voices faded.
    Only two or three. Had Adam’s been among them?
    She slipped out of the gazebo, looking toward the dock.
    The entire group was now gone. Amazing what his damned appearance had done to her. She’d rushed away, imagined she’d seen blood on her walk, then walked around like an idiot while everyone who’d left the docks after her was probably already relaxing in a hot tub.
    Even Jem had finished up with the business of rinsing down the equipment and was no doubt comfortably submerged in heat and bubbles in his cottage.
    Everyone had disappeared.
    Disappeared. God, how she hated that word!
    Don’t start thinking about disappearances now! she warned herself.
    This was customarily a quiet time on the island, after the daily dive trip and any of the other activities and lessons, and before the traditional cocktail hour—unless you were Jerry and liked to start cocktail hour early. Though the island was a casual vacation destination, people always had a tendency to dress up for cocktail hour and dinner, at least a little bit. Her guests napped, bathed and indulged themselves—and one another—during this quiet time, as she thought of it after talking with one guest, a kindergarten teacher.
    Quiet time. She needed a little quiet time of her own, with an early start on the cocktail hour thrown in.
    She turned away from the empty dock and hurried along the path, anxious to reach the calm refuge of her own abode. Once her house had been a kitchen for the lodge, but with the installation of smoke detectors and a sprinkler system, the one-time kitchen had been adapted into a charming cottage. There was a central living area, a sunken office off to one side, a small kitchenette, and then her bedroom and bath, the latter huge, with a separate shower stall that offered a dozen jets and a huge Jacuzzi set high atop elegant, tiled steps. It was surrounded by glass, with privacy shutters built along the outside wall. From the bath, she looked out onto a garden area with purple bougainvillea twining over the shutters and a small fountain with a graceful Venus pouring water onto concrete flowers.
    Sam carefully locked her door. She didn’t want to assume that Adam’s being on the island meant he intended to come anywhere near her, but then, she knew the man, and if he wanted something, he would come after it.
    She checked the lock, then leaned against the door, studying her living room walls.
    They were laden with paintings and prints. A few were period pieces and very valuable. Galleons, warships, privateers, all lined her walls, along with some beautiful charts and maps.
    There was a map of Seafire Isle with its surrounding coral reefs and shelves. Once upon a time, the small island had been a dangerous place, teeming with pirates. It had been passed between the Spanish and the British a dozen times. Because of the coral reefs surrounding it, the island was accessible only by smaller ships, and in days gone by, many a poor vessel had been wrecked on her reefs. This map had been sketched in pen and ink during her great-grandfather’s day. It showed the more modern pleasures of the island, the lodge, the scattering of cottages, the docks, the beach, the tennis courts and the golf course. It was quite charmingly drawn, and little had really changed since it had been done.
    But Sam’s eyes were drawn from the Seafire Isle map, and she moved across the room, looking at her father’s favorite. It was a treasure map, drawn in the early eighteen hundreds, encompassing Florida with all its islands, the Gulf Coast and the Caribbean. There were stars and notes attached to