Chapter 17: Secret

"She lied?" Ilia looked at Joe. "You lied?"

"How did you..." Joe looked surprised.

"You wouldn't be foolish enough to play around by the rails in the middle of the night, alone." he explained his reasoning. "So what really happened?"

"Joe?" the doctor looked at her expectantly.

Joe bit her lip. She was warm again, her thought process was back to normal and she could consider this situation carefully.

No one pushed you overboard a ship in the dead of night because they liked you. The water was far too cold. Everyone who ever set foot on a sailing vessel knew about the dangers of hypothermia even in warm weather. If someone pushed her overboard, it was to take her out. And the only reason she could think to do that was because of what she was getting closer and closer to figuring out on the bottom of the sea.

But who was it?

Who pushed her?

All she knew was that it was a push. It wasn't a particularly hard push, just a push. It could have been anybody.

The question was; did she trust everyone in this room.

The doctor was obvious. If he wanted to kill her, he wouldn't have pushed her overboard. When doctors turn killers, they tended to kill in ways that were almost undetectable. And he knew she was on CBI's. He wouldn't try to kill her by putting her in water. For all they knew about the injections, she could have floated there for days without any negative side affects.

There was no question about Kai in Joe's mind. If he had been trying to keep the structure that was underwater a secret, he never would have reported in to Jack. And, on an instinctual level, Joe trusted it. It just came with the territory of being partners.

Ilia was the only one in doubt. She had only been on the Haltija for a little while and she was in on everything. Joe didn't know anything about her except that she was awful quick to get close to Joe and that she didn't have any problems pushing Joe into water.

And even as she considered her, Joe cursed herself for thinking such bad things about a girl who was such a good friend.

Ilia laughed with her, joked with her, gave Joe a tattoo for crying out loud! A tattoo that the doctor assured her, after clicking over it disapprovingly as Kai waited outside for her to change into the sweats she wore now, was already healed and unaffected by the salt water.

Ilia was a dear friend to Joe.

But Joe was analytical. She tried not to let emotion interfere with what she considered completely logical thought. She would tell Ilia but keep an eye on her in the future. No need to not be careful from now on.

Joe realized she had been thinking to herself for a long time while they just stared, waiting for her to answer them.

She took a deep breath and said, "I was pushed."

The reaction was exactly what she predicted.

Ilia and the doctor gasped and, a moment later, Kai demanded, "Who?"

"I don't know." Joe shook her head. "I didn't see. I was getting some fresh air and I felt someone just shove me over."

"Why didn't you say that sooner?" the doctor demanded to know.

Joe sighed. "I just don't want whoever pushed me to know I know. If they think I don't know, they wont be as careful as they would be if they knew I was suspicious."

"Wait, wait, wait." Ilia stopped her. "You mean, someone on this crew? The same people we've been at sea with for weeks? Months in Kai's case."

Joe nodded. "Thing about a ship is, there's no where to run to. We'll find whoever did it."

"Oh, my God..." Ilia whispered in horror. "I might have slept with a murder..."

"How many people have you slept with on this ship?" Kai asked looking genuinely curious. Ilia didn't answer. She was deep in thought.

"Ilia, I'll speak to you alone later." the doctor told her but she didn't appear to hear. "Joe, are you sure about this? Being pushed and keeping it quiet?"

Joe nodded, completely sure.

"Then I'll respect your wishes." he said. "Kai, may I ask you to escort Joe to her room? Ilia, you stay here."

Joe hopped down off the table, feeling almost completely revived. Nothing a little rest wouldn't cure completely.

"Don't worry about it, Ilia." Joe told her as she left. "It might be a girl."

Joe shut the door behind her and smiled at Kai. He was still standing a bit away from her as if afraid just getting close to her would make her hypothermic all over again.

"Shall we?" Joe asked.

Kai nodded. But he didn't take her arm or her hand like he normally would, he just led her silently back to her room.

He didn't speak, obviously lost in his own thoughts as he kept about three feet between him and Joe, front to back.

Joe let him, just watching him walk.

He was agitated, she could tell just by how his muscles had bunched in his back.

But she didn't speak until he got back to her door, said good night, and turned to leave.

"I'm not going to break, you know." Joe said making him pause then turn back to her.

"What?" he asked.

"You can touch me now." Joe held out her arms, wanting him to come into them. "Come on. You haven't touched me since they fished me from the water."

"I'm too cold." he said."

"Your average body temperature is 90 degrees, not 30. You can hold me." Joe laughed. "I'm plenty warm now, Kai."

He hesitated a moment longer.

So Joe rolled her eyes and went to him instead.

She wrapped her arms up around his back and held him tight even as his own arms remained limp at his side.

"I'm sorry I made you worry." Joe told him softly. "But I'm fine now."

"...You could have died." he finally said. "What if you..."

"I didn't." Joe looked up at him, resting her chin on his chest. "I had those CBI's in me. They saved me."

Kai let out a great breath, like he was releasing a great weight, and he threw his arms around her, squeezing her just a bit too tight but Joe didn't care.

"Kyma tis kardias mou, you don't ever scare me like that." he told her fiercely. "Pote xana. Never again."

"I wont." Joe promised.

"Next time you want air at night, Kyma Kardia, you come to me first." he told her. "You never go up on deck alone again, katalavainoun? Understand?"

"I understand." Joe nodded, smiling a bit. He was a bit angry, his face contorting a bit, not much but a bit. And she noticed a sudden accent in his language that hadn't been there before that got the thicker the more he talked.

He took a deep breath of her hair, something Joe noticed he did a lot. He seemed to enjoy the smell of it which, considering that you couldn't smell anything underwater, was a bit strange yet still somehow a turn on for her.

He began kissing her head, trailing down. Kissing a line down her forehead, down her cheek, dusting across her lips, kissing the curve of her chin.

Joe moaned a bit as his finger tips started rubbing gently up and down her back. They slipped under her sweat shirt, then kept doing it on her bare skin making it tingle, making her breathing hasten.

She moved her hands up and buried them in his hair. It was smooth, like silk, and she felt a bit jealous of it.

But running it through her fingers, touching the soft white strands, was incredible. She remembered how he had messaged her scalp and repeated the process to him.

He groaned a bit in the back of his throat appreciatively as he kissed a strand of her hair before going back to her mouth.

Their bodies were curved into each other, as if each contour was made to fit the other like a puzzle piece.

Suddenly, Kai backed off.

They were both breathing hard and his black eyes were somehow darker than before.

"Go to bed." he said, his voice husky with desire.

"Come with me." Joe whispered, smiling a bit.

Kai shook his head. "You need rest. Get some."

He kissed her forehead, took another breath of her hair, then let her go.

"Meanie." Joe pouted a bit. She felt so...sexy with him. He just made her feel so incredible, like she was a queen.

"Later, Kyma Kardia." he promised, caressing her cheek. "For now, you need rest."

"It would certainly make me hotter." Joe tempted him.

"Bed." he said firmly.

Joe sighed but turned away from him and went into her room, wondering if she should take a cold shower after just getting over hypothermia.

XXXXXXX

Cripin was firmly gagged. There wasn't anything covering his mouth but he had a dog collar, a bit adapted, around his neck. If there was any vibrations of his vocal cords, it would shock him. He had already tried it and was left with a wicked burn from the attempt. There would be no using his voice to escape

He didn't know where he was. All he knew was that it was a dark room with four other people in it.

One was a changer who had been given a steadier injection. It was pretty much the exact opposite of a CBI. It kept a changer from making the change into anything. The poor girl was stuck as a dog, a mastiff. At least she wasn't wearing a shock collar but she was muzzled.

The other two were human girls and one, he was horrified to see, was pregnant. They were being fed regularly and the food wasn't awful.

But the fact was that they were all in this room, trapped.

They weren't bound, they didn't need to be. The only exits were a steal door that was firmly locked and an airvent on the ceiling about a square foot in size and over twenty feet from the ground.

Crispin spent his time trying to comfort the girls the best he could. He could whisper extremely quietly but his voice had very little power when whispered.

Siren voices got their power because of the affect they had on brain waves, at least that's how it worked as far as he understood it. All he knew was that he spoke and, if the other person had a weaker will than his own, they were put under his thrall.

However, if he couldn't speak up, be heard, his voice had almost no affect. But he whispered, most particularly to the pregnant lady, to stay calm, to stay healthy. Trying to keep all three of them relatively calm.

It wasn't much, but it was all he could do.