Deep Waters Read online

  PRAISE FOR JAYNE ANN KRENTZ’S

  DEEP WATERS

  “Adventure, humor, romance, and a great supporting cast of characters add up to another very enjoyable novel by Jayne Ann Krentz.”

  —Library Journal

  “Highly recommended for anyone feeling the winter blahs.… The clever and constant repartee between Charity and Elias is of the laugh-aloud quality without being slapstick. The sexual tension and subsequent lovemaking burn holes in the paper.”

  —Bookpage

  “The inimitable style of Ms. Krentz shines supremely in DEEP WATERS. The characters are darling and quirky, and the plot is vintage. The reader will be alternately entertained with humor, suspense, lavish sensuality, and all-around great pleasure. Pamper yourselves; this one is worth it.”

  —Rendezvous

  “A fun read.… Krentz has a real gift for dreaming up unusual characters, and DEEP WATERS is up to her usual standards.…”

  —The Oakland Press (Pontiac, MI)

  “Krentz fans will be very pleased with her latest.… DEEP WATERS has everything Krentz fans have come to expect and more.… Submerse yourself in an entertaining and satisfying love story.”

  —Compuserve Romance Reviews

  “Ms. Krentz does it all well.… There is instant tension and mixed feelings between Charity and Elias.…”

  —The Chattanooga (TN) Times

  “Superb.… Quirky humor and passionate romance with a touch of suspense.”

  —Romantic Times

  JAYNE ANN KRENTZ’S PREVIOUS NOVELS

  ABSOLUTELY, POSITIVELY

  “[A] cheerful escapist package combining sex and mystery.…”

  —Cosmopolitan

  “A delight.… Krentz’s leads are engaging and believable.…

  It’s no wonder that the author’s novels consistently hit bestseller lists—as this one should too, absolutely, positively.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  TRUST ME

  “As in all Ms. Krentz’s books, her characters are colorful, unique individuals who draw the reader into the story immediately. Secondary characters are unusual and amusing.… Great fun to read.”

  —Rendezvous

  “The pace is brisk and the high-tech gloss fun.… This should please Krentz’s readership and may even lure some of her Amanda Quick fans into the 20th century.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  GRAND PASSION

  “Filled with the kind of intelligent, offbeat characters … [who] are so fun to get to know that it’s hard to close the book on them.”

  —USA Today

  “Krentz at her best … with the snappy dialogue that has become her trademark and a cast of characters you want to know personally.”

  —Sandra Brown

  HIDDEN TALENTS

  “With Hidden Talents, Jayne Ann Krentz once again demonstrates her unparalleled ability to create a marvelously humorous, suspenseful, and romantic tale.”

  —Romantic Times

  WILDEST HEARTS

  “The phenomenal Jayne Ann Krentz once again delivers one of her patented storytelling gems.… Another guaranteed top-notch read!”

  —Romantic Times

  FAMILY MAN

  “I love Jayne’s writing.… This book is no exception.… Filled with quirky secondary characters, this book’s a winner.”

  —Heart to Heart

  PERFECT PARTNERS

  “Bold style and a wicked sense of humor.… Toss in a gaggle of vividly drawn minor characters … and it adds up to entertaining contemporary romance.… Krentz is in top form.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  SWEET FORTUNE

  “The inimitable Jayne Ann Krentz is back wheeling and dealing in corporate boardrooms for our reading pleasure.… Always a consistent delight, Ms. Krentz has penned another winner.”

  —Rave Reviews

  SILVER LININGS

  “Wonderful characters, a great plot with lots of action, and a fine romance with lots of sparks—what more could you ask for?”

  —Rendezvous

  Books by Jayne Ann Krentz

  The Golden Chance

  Silver Linings

  Sweet Fortune

  Perfect Partners

  Family Man

  Wildest Hearts

  Hidden Talents

  Grand Passion

  Trust Me

  Absolutely, Positively

  Deep Waters

  By Jayne Ann Krentz writing as Jayne Castle

  Amaryllis

  Published by POCKET BOOKS

  For orders other than by individual consumers, Pocket Books grants a discount on the purchase of 10 or more copies of single titles for special markets or premium use. For further details, please write to the Vice-President of Special Markets, Pocket Books, 1633 Broadway, New York, NY 10019-6785, 8th Floor.

  For information on how individual consumers can place orders, please write to Mail Order Department, Simon & Schuster Inc., 200 Old Tappan Road, Old Tappan, NJ 07675.

  The sale of this book without its cover is unauthorized. If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that it was reported to the publisher as “unsold and destroyed.” Neither the author nor the publisher has received payment for the sale of this “stripped book.”

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  A Pocket Star Book published by

  POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon & Schuster Inc.

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  Copyright © 1996 by Jayne Ann Krentz

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Pocket Books. 1230 Avenue of the Americas. New York. NY 10020

  ISBN: 1-4391-5452-X

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4391-5452-6

  eISBN-13: 978-1-4516-2400-7

  First Pocket Books paperback printing December 1997

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  POCKET STAR BOOKS and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster Inc.

  Cover art by Tom Hallman

  Printed in the U.S.A.

  For my brother,

  Stephen Castle,

  with love

  Prologue: Charity

  The sea lures the unwary with the promise of freedom, but it harbors great risk.

  —“On the Way of Water,” from the journal of Hayden Stone

  The panic attack struck as Charity Truitt swept through the glass-paned French doors of one of the most exclusive business clubs in Seattle. It hit her with the force of a stiff jolt of electricity. Her pulse pounded. She could scarcely breathe. Perspiration suddenly threatened to ruin her outrageously sophisticated red silk dress. Luckily, she hadn’t paid retail for the overpriced scrap of designer whimsy. Her family owned the store in which it had been on display in the couture section.

  Charity came to a halt in the doorway of the private lounge that had been reserved for the occasion. She struggled to take a deep breath. She put up an even more valiant fight to conceal the fact that she had a major problem on her hands. It occurred to her that those in the well-dressed crowd who noticed her hovering there on the threshold probably thought she was making an intentionally dramatic entrance. The truth was, she was on the verge of panicked flight.

  With the iron-willed discipline of a woman who had been running a corporation since the age of twenty-four, she forced herself to smile while anxiety shredded her insides.

  It wasn’t the first panic attack she had endured. They had been striking wit
h increasing frequency during the past four months, destroying her sleep, making her edgy and restless, and, worst of all, raising dark questions about her mental health.

  The attacks had driven her first to her doctor and then to a therapist. She got some technical explanations but no real answers.

  An unprovoked fight-or-flight response, the therapist had said. An evolutionary throwback to the days when we all lived in caves and worried about monsters in the night. Stress was usually a contributing factor.

  But now, tonight, Charity suddenly knew the real reason for the attacks. She realized at last what, or, rather, who, triggered the surges of panic. His name was Brett Loftus, owner of Loftus Athletic Gear. He was big, well over six feet tall, and, at thirty, still endowed with the body of the varsity football star he had once been. He was also blond, brown-eyed, and good-looking in an engaging, old-fashioned, western hero sort of way. Just to top it off, he was hugely successful and a really nice man.

  Charity liked him, but she did not love him. She was pretty sure that she could never love him. Worse, she had a strong hunch that her stepsister, Meredith, and the easygoing, good-natured Brett were perfect for each other. The recent panic attacks had not diminished all of her near-legendary intuition.

  Unfortunately, it was Charity, not Meredith, who was supposed to announce her engagement to the heir to the Loftus empire tonight.

  The merger was to be a business move as well as a personal union. In a few weeks, Loftus Athletic Gear would be joining with the family-owned Truitt department store chain to form Truitt-Loftus.

  The new company would be one of the largest privately owned retailers in the Northwest. If all went well, it would begin expanding into the exciting Pacific Rim market within two years.

  For the sake of the family and business responsibilities that she had shouldered so early, Charity was about to marry a man who gave her anxiety attacks every time he took her into his arms.

  It was not Brett’s fault that he was so big that she got claustrophobic when he kissed her, she thought wildly. It was her problem. She had to deal with it.

  It was her responsibility to solve problems. She was good at that kind of thing. People expected her to take command, to manage whatever crisis happened to present itself.

  Charity’s hands tingled. She could not get any air into her lungs. She was going to faint, right here in front of some of the most influential and powerful people in the Northwest.

  She had a humiliating vision of herself collapsed facedown on the Oriental rug, surrounded by bemused friends, business associates, competitors, rivals, and, worst of all, a few chosen members of the local media.

  “Charity?”

  The sound of her own name startled her. Charity whirled, red silk skirts whipping around her ankles, and looked up at her stepsister, Meredith.

  A long way up.

  At twenty-nine, Charity was five years older than Meredith, but she was only five foot four inches tall on her best days. Even the three-inch red heels she wore tonight did not put her at eye level with five-foot-ten Meredith, who was also wearing heels.

  Statuesque and crowned with a glorious mane of strawberry-blond hair, Meredith was always a stunning sight. Never more so, however, than when she was dressed to the teeth, as she was this evening. No one, Charity thought wistfully, could wear clothes the way her stepsister did.

  With her strong, classical features and subtle air of sophistication, Meredith could have made her living as a professional model. She had actually done some in-store fashion work for the Truitt chain during her college days, but her savvy talent and her love of the family business had propelled her straight into management.

  “Are you all right?” Meredith’s light, jade green eyes narrowed in concern.

  “I’m fine.” Charity glanced around quickly. “Is Davis here?”

  “He’s at the bar, talking to Brett.”

  Unable to see over the heads of the people who stood between her and the club bar, Charity peered through cracks in the crowd. She managed to catch a glimpse of her stepbrother.

  Davis was a year and a half older and three inches taller than Meredith. A deeply ingrained flare for retailing and boundless enthusiasm for the Truitt chain had defined his career path, also. Charity had recognized his abilities from the start. Six months ago she had decided to ignore whining accusations of nepotism and promote him to a vice presidency in the company. It was a family business, after all. And she, herself, had become president at an extraordinarily early age.

  Davis’s hair was the same arresting shade as his sister’s, and his eyes were a similar pale green. The colors and the height had come from Fletcher Truitt, Charity’s stepfather.

  Charity had received her own dark auburn hair and hazel eyes from her mother. She had few memories of her biological father. A professional photographer, Samson Lapford had abandoned his family when Charity was three years old to travel the world shooting pictures of volcanoes and rain forests. He had been killed in a fall while trying to get a close-up of a rare fern that only grew on the sides of certain South American mountains.

  Fletcher Truitt was the only father Charity had ever known, and he had been a good one. For his sake and the sake of her mother, she had done her best to fill his shoes since their deaths five years before and hold the family inheritance together for her step-siblings.

  The crowd shifted slightly, allowing another view of the bar. Charity saw Brett Loftus, sun-bright hair gleaming in the subdued light, broad shoulders looking even more massive than usual in a tux. A good-natured Norse god of a man, he lounged with negligent ease next to Davis.

  Charity shuddered. Once again all the oxygen in the room seemed to disappear. Her palms were so damp she dared not dry them on the expensive fabric of her gown.

  Davis was big, but Brett was huge. Charity told herself that there were any number of women in the room who would have traded their Truitt credit cards for a chance to be swept off their feet by Brett Loftus. Sadly, she was not one of them.

  The reality of what was happening sent a shock wave through her. With searing certainty she suddenly knew that she could not go through with the engagement, not even for the sake of her step-siblings’ inheritance, the altar on which she had sacrificed the past five years of her life.

  “Maybe you need a glass of champagne, Charity.” Meredith took her arm. “Come on, let’s go join Brett and Davis. You know, you’ve been acting a little strange lately. I think you’ve been working too hard. Maybe trying to combine the merger with your engagement plans was a bit too much. Now there’s the wedding to schedule and a honeymoon.”

  “Too much.” The panic was almost intolerable. She would go crazy if she didn’t get out of here. She had to escape. “Yes. Too much. I have to leave, Meredith.”

  “What?” Meredith started to turn, an expression of astonishment on her face.

  “Right now.”

  “Calm down, Charity. What are you saying? You can’t just run off. What would Brett think? Not to mention all these people we’ve invited.”

  Guilt and the old steely sense of duty swamped Charity. For a few seconds, the combination did battle with the anxiety and managed to gain control.

  “You’re right,” Charity gasped. “I can’t run away yet. I have to explain to Brett.”

  Meredith looked genuinely alarmed now. “Explain what to Brett?”

  “That I can’t do this. I tried. God knows, I tried. I told myself that it was the right thing to do for everyone. But it’s not right. Brett is too nice, he doesn’t deserve this.”

  “Deserve what? Charity, you’re not making any sense.”

  “I’ve got to tell him. I hope he’ll understand.”

  “Maybe we should go someplace private to discuss this,” Meredith said urgently. “How about the ladies’ room?”

  “I don’t think that’s necessary.” Charity rubbed her forehead. She could not concentrate. Like a gazelle at the water hole, she kept scanning the bushes, watching for
lions. “With any luck, I won’t be sick until after I get out of here.”

  Through sheer force of will, a will that had been tempered in fire when she had assumed the reins of her family’s faltering department store chain, Charity fought the panic. She made her way through the crowd toward the bar. It was like walking a gauntlet.

  Brett and Davis both turned to her as she emerged from the throng. Davis gave her a brotherly grin of welcome and raised his wineglass in a cheerful toast.

  “About time you got here, Charity,” he said. “Thought maybe you got held up at the office.”

  Brett smiled affectionately. “You look terrific, honey. Ready for the big announcement?”

  “No,” Charity said baldly. She came to a halt in front of him. “Brett, I am very, very sorry, but I can’t go through with this.”

  Brett frowned. “Something wrong?”

  “Me. I’m wrong for you. And you’re wrong for me. I like you very much. You’ve been a good friend, and you would have made a fine business partner. But I can’t marry you.”

  Brett blinked. Davis stared at her slack-jawed. Meredith’s eyes widened in shock. Charity was dimly aware of the hush that had descended on the nearby guests. Heads turned.

  “Oh, lord, this is going to be even worse than I thought,” Charity whispered. “I am so sorry. Brett, you’re a fine man. You deserve to marry for love and passion, not for friendship or business reasons.”

  Brett slowly put down his glass. “I don’t understand.”

  “Neither did I until now. Brett, I can’t go through with this engagement. It would not be fair to either of us. We don’t love each other. We’re friends and business associates, but that’s not enough. I can’t do it. I thought I could, but I can’t.”

  No one said a word. Everyone in the room was now staring at Charity, transfixed. The panic surged through her again.

  “Oh, God, I’ve got to get out of here.” She swung around and found Meredith blocking her path. “Get out of the way. Please.”

  “Charity, this is crazy.” Meredith caught hold of her shoulders. “You can’t run off like this. How can you not want to marry Brett? He’s perfect. Do you hear me? Perfect.”