Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  About This Book

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Epilogue

  About Hale

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  Copyright Page

  About This Book

  Training in underwater recovery techniques, Bronson didn’t expect to recover a body, particularly one with a knife embedded into a diver’s back. Down in Mexico, often anything goes, but he’s been on many dives in his life and has been through a lot of this country, yet at no time had he seen this scenario.

  Her missing brother being found sends Robin deep into grief and guilt. Her brother had been much older, living a risky lifestyle on the fringe of society in a small coastal Mexican town. She’d arrived six months earlier in an attempt to help him get his life together.

  Finding out what happened is paramount. Yet, as the twisted tale unravels, the betrayals and secrets finally come to light. Bronson and Robin must protect themselves, before the wrong person finds out exactly what they’ve discovered.

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  Prologue

  Bronson Manchester surfaced on the ocean at the side of the Zodiac. He looked around to see the rest of his team rising out of the water too. He’d been doing special underwater training for recovery operations all week. But he hadn’t expected to see three of his team members here.

  It had been a great week, as Marshall, their dive instructor, spoke to the team. “Okay, check your gauges. We’re going down for one more dive, and that’ll be it for this week.” He added, “This one will be more for fun than anything. You guys have worked hard all week, and I’m really proud of your progress.” It took another little bit to get everybody geared up and back in again, and then down.

  As Bronson floated underneath, letting his body weight just take him down, they were in about seventy-five feet of water, and a couple old wrecks were around here that they were looking forward to playing in. He wanted to just have a chance to enjoy this dive. He loved scuba diving, always had, and it was definitely his thing.

  Something was just so very special about it all—the feeling of weightlessness, the weird sensation of seeing the surface above your head, yet going farther and farther down, the oddity of landing on the ocean floor and realizing that you’re probably the only human to have ever stepped in that actual spot. As he came down, he looked for his buddy and saw Gavin off to the side.

  They were both two-year SEALs, each having just arrived at Coronado to join Mason’s team. And, hey, it wasn’t just one team anymore; Mason had multiple teams, but Bronson was doing this extraordinary water training so they could do more of the dive trips.

  He loved it and would have taken a career in this easily. He even thought about it afterward. Maybe, when he retired, he’d go down to the Bahamas and have a dive shop somewhere. Gavin signaled that he was heading off to the right. Feeling quite amiable and not really caring where they went, Bronson followed his buddy. It was only smart to dive in teams of at least two, though he found that anything more than four was a lot to keep track of. It was easier when something went wrong though. To go alone was fine if you were on a mission. Not necessarily the smartest idea, but it was definitely needed and necessary at times.

  As they moved forward, they headed to the wreck, where Gavin disappeared down the hatch. Bronson stayed on the outside, looking to see what kind of barnacles and interesting algae grew here. Things like that always blew him away, fascinated by the set of circumstances that created these microecosystems in the water. When he didn’t see Gavin pop up again, Bronson headed inside the shipwreck, just in time to see Gavin coming toward him, but obviously something was wrong.

  Bronson watched, following his buddy’s hand signals, as he pointed behind him, then turned and headed back to where he’d come from. As Bronson joined him down there, Bronson saw the other divers on the opposite side of the wreck, so they weren’t in the same part as he and his partner were. Gavin pointed to his tank and his regulator, signaling that he had to go up, but he also signaled that he wanted Bronson to look at something here.

  Following Gavin’s hand signals again, Bronson headed into the depths of the ship, which had been pretty well destroyed by the years. There was no real belowdecks portion anymore; it was just what was hidden underneath some of the rotten wood timbers. He saw what looked like a flipper. He headed closer and then his heart started to pound, as he realized what he was looking at. It was an actual diver’s flipper, with another to match, both connected to two legs.

  A man was underneath the rubble. Bronson grabbed the man and noted that, without a face mask or regulator, he was long dead.

  Chapter 1

  Bronson Manchester studied the facial features of the dead man stretched out in front of him, not for the first time. The divers had gone down to recover the body, now floating on the surface of the water, and brought him back up to the boat.

  Their scuba instructor, Marshall, had cried out, “Dear God, that’s … Jason Rancher. He’s a regular diver around here. Almost a local at this point.”

  “Yeah, well, I presume he didn’t usually dive with the knife in his back,” Bronson noted, his tone caustic, as he pointed out the obvious weapon.

  Marshall shook his head, obviously disturbed.

  “Presumably he had enemies, given the way he ended up,” Bronson added.

  “I thought people liked him,” Marshall noted. “He seemed to relate with the tourists.”

  “Not everybody,” Bronson stated quietly, “or he wouldn’t be sporting that weapon.”

  With a nod of his head, the instructor turned away from the body. “We need to bring in the authorities.”

  “Yeah, I presume he wasn’t part of your instructor group,” Bronson said.

  Marshall shook his head. “He was at one time but hasn’t been for a couple years. He became too unreliable, and there was some trouble, and it just wasn’t working anymore.”

  “Interesting. What does he do for a living now then?”

  “I don’t know,” Marshall replied, “but, like a lot of people around here, he manages.”

  As they got closer to shore, they heard a shout. Marshall looked up and frowned. “Uh-oh, now we’ll have trouble.”

  “Why is that?” Bronson asked.

  “It’s his sister, his much younger sister. Lot of years between them, and they seem like they’re pretty close. Instead of big brother looking out after her, she seemed to be watching out for Jason. This won’t go well.”

  “These things will always be hard,” Bronson noted, his tone low. “Loss isn’t easy on anybody. And murder multiplies that.”

  “And on her, it will be even worse,” Marshall added. “It was just the two of them.”

  Bronson nodded, as he studied the woman approaching. Long-legged, lean, and wearing a dress that flowed around her ankles, her hair was flying up behind her. “She looks a little familiar.”

  “She’s a dive instructor too,” he stated, “and a really popular one at that.”

  The wry tone of his voice suggested something about her popularity, maybe because she was pretty. The fact was, she was beautiful. Stunning. “Military as well?”

  “Yes, but that’s because she specializes in certain types of equipment,” he explained, “especially testing them. Research of some sort.”

  “Interesting. She looks young for it.”

  “She is young for it,” he confirmed, “yet she’s damn good at her job. She was born in the water, quite literally.” Bronson continued to watch her, as Marshall nodded. “Both of her parents were instructors, and they worked for a private company for a long time, doing exploration and mapping of the ocean floor. She headed into the same field. Unfortunately her brother, Jason here, has had some issues lately,” he related, looking down at the dead man. “So, she took some time away to spend it with him.”

  “What kind of issues?” Bronson asked, intrigued, considering Jason had obviously been murdered.

  “He was a drunk,” Marshall stated, “although I really don’t want to be telling tales.”

  “He is clearly the victim of foul play, so any tales you want to tell—”

  “It’s just that he was struggling. I mean, it will be an issue for the local authorities of course,” Marshall murmured, “but I can tell you that he went a little bit off the rails when his wife died.”

  “That’ll do it,” Bronson noted sympathetically.

  “Jason swears she was murdered,” Marshall added, in a quiet tone, shaking his head. “That’s why his sister came to join him.” As he looked overboard, the woman waded toward them. “Robin, wait,” he called out.

  She glared at him. “Is that my brother?” He nodded slowly, and immediately grief churned her features. “Damn it. What the hell happened?” she demanded.

  Bronson hopped into the water and walked toward her. “Hey. I found him down below on a dive. We were doing a training session.”

  She looked at him and nodded slowly. “That makes sense. Did he have all his gear with him?”

  He hesitated. “No mask. No regulator. … It wasn’t an accident.”

  She st
ared at him for a long moment, not comprehending. “What do you mean?” she asked, her voice going faint.

  “I mean, that he was stabbed,” Bronson murmured. “I’m pretty sure he would have died from the injury alone, long before he ran out of oxygen.”

  She stared at Bronson in shock, then turned to the boat. “Jesus, Jason.”

  “So he’s your brother?”

  She nodded slowly. “Yes. … I came here to spend some time with him.”

  “You’re a dive instructor, I hear?”

  “Among other things,” she replied, with a wave of her hand. “Please don’t go on about how young I am for it.” He frowned at her, while she glared at him. “I’ve heard it over and over again, and I’m just sick of it.”

  “You are young,” he confirmed, “but, if you started early, you’d still have a good dozen years under your belt.”

  “More than that actually. Well over a dozen years under my belt,” she stated. “Why isn’t Marshall bringing Jason in?”

  “I assume he’s waiting for the authorities,” Bronson shared quietly.

  “I want to see him,” she said abruptly.

  “You can, but I’m not sure this is necessarily how you’ll want to remember him.”

  “I’m not a child,” she snapped, her tone crisp. She walked around him in the water and called out to the instructor. “Marshall, bring him in. I want to see him.” When the dive instructor hesitated, she shook her head. “If I can’t do anything for him, then there’s no reason not to see him. He’s my brother, and, if he died from foul play, … you know that investigation will be something I’ll want a hand in. I’d just as soon see for myself what the truth is before it gets twisted.”

  Bronson turned sharply to stare at her.

  She glared at him again. “Don’t you start either.”

  “I haven’t started anything yet,” he replied, “but it sounds like you don’t think he’ll get a fair investigation.”

  “He won’t,” she declared. Then she stopped and took a deep breath. “He’s had some issues lately,” she admitted. “He got himself into some trouble, and some of that trouble involves the local police.”

  “I’m sorry,” he murmured.

  “Me too.” She sighed. “And this being Mexico, it’s just that much more of a problem.”

  “Yet they’ll still have an investigation.”

  “Yeah, they will, but that doesn’t mean it’ll go anywhere.”

  “Got it,” he murmured. “Is he an American?”

  “He is, but he’s been down here for the better part of the last two years.”

  “Since he lost his wife?”

  She shot him a look. “You pick up information quickly.”

  “Yeah,” he agreed. “You tend to think about things like that when you find a dead man. You wonder about his family and what brought him here to this point.”

  “His wife died of breast cancer. So, to get away from the memories, he ended up losing himself in the bottle, among other things. He’s been pulling himself back out slowly, but, in the process, he managed to make a lot of enemies,” she murmured. “I know that some of the memories he made here won’t work in his favor.”

  “Right, so they’ll say it was his lifestyle that led to a bad end. Case closed.”

  “Exactly.”

  “I thought the instructor …” And then Bronson hesitated.

  She looked at him, frowning. “What?”

  “I thought Marshall told me that the wife was murdered.”

  “My brother believed she was. He railed how the treatments she received were not the right ones.”

  “And was there any truth to that?”

  “It’s hard to say,” she said, “but honestly I don’t think so. I think my brother just couldn’t accept the fact that nothing could be done to save her.”

  “Which is not an unusual response to extreme trauma,” Bronson murmured. The instructor brought the boat closer to Bronson, who grabbed the rope tossed at him, then walked the boat closer to the shore. As soon as it was close enough for her, she hopped in and immediately knelt over her brother.

  Bronson saw the grief in her expression, as she studied Jason’s features. With the instructor’s help, they shifted him ever-so-slightly, so that she could see the knife in his back. It was buried deep, clear to the hilt.

  “God.” She stared at it. Then she sat back and looked up at the instructor. “Did you call it in?”

  He nodded. “I had to. You know that.”

  “Sure,” she muttered. “I mean, in theory, that’s the process.”

  “They’re not all corrupt,” Bronson said, and again she nodded absently. But there wasn’t any conviction in her tone when she next spoke.

  “No, they’re not. Not all of them.”

  Bronson understood. When you’ve had one bad experience, it was easy to color the entire thing with prejudice. She got up and slowly made her way to the hull of the boat. He reached up a hand to help her out onto the soft wet sand. Without even thinking about it, she accepted the assist. He wondered whether she’d even seen his hand or just the dead body of her brother.

  “I’m sorry,” he murmured again.

  “Where was he found?” she asked abruptly. “Could you take me there?”

  He stared at her for a long moment and then nodded. Since she was a diver herself, she would probably go either way. Better if he went too, always diving in pairs. “I could, but will that help?”

  “It would help me, if nothing else,” she replied. “Closure is pretty important in these things.”

  He nodded. “When do you want to go?”

  She smiled. “Right now. How long are you here for? You’re here training on something, aren’t you?”

  He nodded. “Yeah, and I’m supposed to head back out to the ship tonight.”

  She frowned at that. “Can you get your shore leave extended?”

  “I’ll have to talk to somebody, but it’s possible, under the circumstances.”

  “Then please do, if you can. I want to see where my brother was murdered. I’ll go get a boat and meet you back here.”

  He winced, watching her leave, just as Gavin stepped up behind him.

  “Hey, buddy. I’m pretty sure you could stay for another day, if you want to. We also know that life happens.” At Bronson’s silence, Gavin added, “Call Mason. He would understand. You could probably catch us at the next port, and, considering that we’re heading home to Coronado anyway, I don’t see that as a problem. Take a couple days, help her out, do what you need to do,” he suggested. “If it were me, I’d do it. Besides, I understand her point about wanting to see where it happened.”

  “I do too,” Bronson admitted.

  “If it was your brother, you’d want to go back out again.”

  “Sure, but, if I don’t go, then I could still make the ship.”

  “Maybe, but I suspect it won’t be quite so easy as all that.” At the teasing tone in Gavin’s voice, Bronson turned back to study his friend’s face in suspicion, then pivoted to see where Robin had got to. “Why is that?”

  Gavin grinned at him. “Because I saw the way you looked at her.”

  “She’s just had a hell of a shock and a loss,” Bronson replied. “How am I supposed to look at her?”

  “Like you did, as if you cared. Besides, everybody knows you’re a real softie.”

  He frowned. “And that means I looked at her how?”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Gavin said, with a knowing grin. “Come on. Let’s go make the phone calls.”

  And, with that, the two of them headed back in. It didn’t take long to make arrangements, and, sure enough, Bronson was given the time off without an issue. It wasn’t even time off, per se. As soon as they realized that Gavin and Bronson had found the body, the navy immediately issued a stay order for forty-eight hours, so that they could assist the local authorities, as needed. That wasn’t a huge amount of time, but it should be enough.

  If nobody else would take notice or would give a damn about this man’s murder, Bronson would. He did feel like he needed to be here for another day or so, just to make sure Robin didn’t do anything stupid or get herself in trouble. At least she could also help give Bronson an idea of who could possibly be part of this murder. Not that it was his job. Particularly since Jason was an American citizen, so the consulate would get involved, and that wasn’t exactly a pathway Bronson wanted to go down either. But an investigation should be properly carried out.