Page 72 of Sucker For You

“Hell no.”

“Suit yourself. Or—don’t. The water’s freezing, but I’m not using neoprene. It affects my balance too much, especially when I’m trying to stabilize my Nikon.”

“Because stability’s always been your strong suit.”

“At least I’m consistent with my sunscreen now!”

More laughter followed. Next came details of Adrian’s urbangreening proposal for the California Academy of Sciences that he’d be pitching soon in San Francisco, then updates on Erin’s electromagnetic quantum-gravity research, marathon training regimen, her plans with Ethan to attend a satellite launch in CapeCanaveral—and their mother’s renovations to the Monaghans’ family room in Grand Arbor, Michigan. Lori Monaghan was calmly, effectively bullying the builders to finish work before the winter holidays, when her adult children would congregate at home.

“Will Ethan be joining us, sweetheart?”

“Yes. But this time, I’m hiding all the hot-sauce bottles—”

“Thank you.”

“Unless we have someone else new at the house this year,” Adrian jumped in. “Wild guess: what if Isabel also needs somewhere to go in December? She’s already putting up with Wes in close quarters, so that’s a good—”

“No! Mind your own damn business.” Wes snorted. “Isabel’s too smart to fall for any hot-sauce bullshit. She doesn’t need to prove anything to you by surviving them, either.”

Smart?

Despite his shadowing presence at MORI, which she’d identified as his mistrust in her ability to handle herself and her investigation. . . Wes actually thought she was smart?

She doesn’t need to prove anything.

She did, though. She had to prove so much. But to know that she and Wes disagreed about her need to prove her value to his family, thatthis—of all things!—would have made them argue? Swallowing, she reached for her discarded phone. She had to type in her password to unlock the screen. It didn’t recognize her smile.

*

Wes was in the kitchen again the next morning, mugs and cereal waiting on the counter, leftovers from the Haute Tamale packedfor lunch. They fed the octopus: two sea snails and a shrimp, with a gastropod from yesterday as a snack. Isabel studied the two-spot, frowning. It was odd that she hadn’t eaten her own leftovers. Maybe they’d been overfeeding her? (That wasn’t likely with a growing juvenile, though.) They cleaned the tank’s protein skimmer and then drove to the institute for their shifts, where they sifted through the bay’s kelp for wrasse (Wes,yes) and MORI’s supplies for both delousing powder (Isabel,yes) and evil dissection tools (Isabel,no).

They reconvened at noon to stroll past boats bobbing in a tidal bore, up Sandholdt Road toward the harbor. After fending off a flock of gulls—Wes had packed a squirt bottle filled with hot sauce, which he wielded at both his sandwich and the birds; Isabel failed to contain another smile and to capture the moment on camera, shaking with silent laughter—they walked along the beach to investigate interesting bits of bleached driftwood. Then they kicked sand from their boots and returned to the octopus.

Along with the cephalopod, Isabel’s napkin list of questions was waiting for them.

When Wes nicked his thumb de-veining shrimp, she fished an adhesive strip from a medical kit that he carried in his duffel and asked about the scar that bisected his right eyebrow.

“Shit, yeah. . . I was diving alone near the Jardines de la Reina archipelago, off southern Cuba. Plenty of sharks. Crocodiles, too. But the scar’s just from a jellyfish.” He wrinkled his nose, wrapping the tape snugly around his finger. “A Bonaire banded box jellyfish, though, so it hurt like hell. It brushed me while I was adjusting my snorkel mask, and I thought I’d lit my face on fire. Seems like I’ve got bad luck with these suckers.”

“Stingers.”

“Right. I didn’t have a marine biologist to patch me up, either.”

Water glistening on the muscle cording his shoulders, wet hair curling at his nape, his freckles and tattoo ink stark against abraded skin—

“S-should—um, should you have been out there by yourself, so far from shore?”

“I was in my twenties. I was an idiot. That same trip, I drowned the pain with tequila and woke up in a tattoo artist’s chair. I left with this albatross on my shoulder. A jellyfish predator.” Wes tossed his knife into the sink. He explained how he’d gotten his half-completed labyrinth inked on Corfu, before a financial upset in Greece’s economy tanked the currency conversion in his bank account. Then there was a reef knot beside a compass over his heart, commemorating his receipt of both a boating license and navigation certificate. “The written exams were bad, but I passed with my dyslexia accommodations. I earned the right to a shellback turtle tattoo after crossing the equator as well. It’s going to be expensive, so I’m waiting. I might put it on my right hip, where the sea nettle got me. The scarring’s ugly. Or I could get the one hundred and eightieth meridian around my elbow?Thatscar tissue’s from a sea lion bite.”

“Oh.”

Isabel didn’t ask to see the trophic white lines straddling his upper thigh. Nor did she trace her fingers over the marks on his elbow. Instead, she grabbed the shrimp and sank her hands into the aquarium.

“What about you?” Wes leaned against the credenza, absently rubbing his arm. “Any scars? Would you ever get a tattoo?”

Hands on her body, needles under her skin?

She converted her cringe into a shrug and offered a piece of prawn to the two-spot. “Possibly.”