Triton Read Online Free PDF Page A

babysitting?”
    “She’s younger than she looks, okay?” He made no effort to hide the edge to his voice. “She’s only fifteen, and she’s not that smart. It’s like I blink, and she’s gone.”
    “Probably just needs her space. You seem like a . . . protective older brother.”
    Cedar nodded, conceding the point. “True.”
    “I’m Naomi, by the way.”
    “Cedar.” He didn’t hold out his hand.
    Naomi ordered a virgin piña colada from the bartender. “So,” she started again, “how are you enjoying the cruise?”
    “I’m not.”
    “Neither am I.”
    He peered sideways at her. “No?”
    “It’s the third cruise my mom’s taken me on this summer. I’ve seen her maybe ten minutes total—she’s an assistant maître d’ on the ship.”
    “Sounds impressive.”
    “It’s not. She’s just a head waiter.”
    “Hey, where do you guys sleep? I’ve always wondered.”
    “Underwater.”
    “Oh. Damn.”
    “Like not actually underwater,” she said, “but below decks, you know, below the surface.”
    “Yeah, I get it.”
    She smiled, an impish little glint in her eyes. “Actually, I have access to crew-only areas. I could show you if you want?”
    Her studied her for a moment, tempted by her offer. He was practically suffocating in this stupid teen zone, after all—his gaze jerked back to Brynn.
    “Oh, come on. She’ll be fine.”
    “She’s never fine.”
    “You should trust her.”
    “ Her? How about the twenty-five hundred douchebags on this boat who would give their left nut to get into her pants.”
    Naomi’s gaze wandered dubiously over Brynn’s tomboyish ponytail, her baggy T-shirt, and the ill-fitting board shorts that fell to her calves. “She’s not that great a catch.”
    Cedar blew air through his lips. “That’s what I keep telling her.”
    “Come on—”Naomi tugged on his T-shirt. “Are you seriously going to babysit her twenty-four hours a day for seven days straight? She’ll be fine.”
    Naomi did have a point.
    Cedar watched his sister, still completely absorbed in a foosball game with a much younger girl. Without makeup, without her blonde hair flying all over the place, dressed in his board shorts—which he’d insisted she wear after the magician fiasco—Brynn might just go unnoticed. Come to think of it, she’d been on especially good behavior the last few minutes.
    In fact, earlier when he’d scrounged up her outfit, she hadn’t even argued. She hadn’t even tried to put on anything skimpy. She hadn’t combed her hair, doused herself in fake perfume, or done anything to make herself into a sexual object. Maybe she’d finally learned her lesson.
    The Brynn playing foosball reminded him of her much younger self, her nine-year-old tomboy self, back when she was innocent and adorable.
    He breathed a contented sigh. Brynn wasn’t planning to sneak off the moment he left, she was just trying to enjoy the cruise like a normal kid.
    Tonight, he could trust her.
    “Hang on.” Cedar crossed the room to the foosball table. “Brynn, as soon as you’re done with this game, go straight back to the cabin, got it?”
    She yawned. “Good idea, I’m getting pretty tired. I’ll call it a night after this game.”
    “ Straight down to the room, Brynn.”
    “Okay.”
    “No detours, no games, no sneaking off. Straight down to the room.”
    “Okay.”
    “We’re in room six sixty, deck fourteen. That’s one level down. One flight of stairs—”
    “I know , Cedar,” she snapped.
    Satisfied that she had at last gotten the point, Cedar followed Naomi out onto the deck. He threw one last glance at Brynn and saw her yawn again and lean back over her game. Outside, a cool night breeze sliced through his shirt. Ah, it felt good to be outside.
    Yet something about Brynn’s response nagged him. She had agreed too easily.
    The moment he was through the door with that girl, Brynn stood up straight, alert and ready, and glanced around the Living Room. Free. She was