Captain's Paradise by Kay Hooper

have turned the head of a stone statue, Michael had no trouble believing they’d drawn a great deal of attention. “I see.”
    “We know the whole story,” Raven told him, serious now. “We’re here to help, Michael.”
    “Look, I appreciate what you’re trying to do.” He had no difficulty in sounding sincere. “ButSutton has a hair-trigger finger, and his men are worse. You can’t—”
    “
You
can’t do it alone,” Raven told him. “Two against at least a dozen? No matter how good you are, you can’t ignore the odds. And Sutton doesn’t know any of us; you’re the red flag.”
    “It’s too dangerous. I can’t ask—”
    “You’re not asking,” Teddy said, studying her fingernails with a frown.
    Michael drew a deep breath and, without looking at Robin, said tautly, “You came to help Robin. Help the both of us by getting her out of this mess now, before she gets hurt.”
    “I’d say it was too late for that,” Kyle said quietly.
    Michael glanced at Robin and wished he hadn’t; the hurt in her eyes was obvious. He felt like a bastard.
    Raven leaned forward and held his gaze with violet eyes that had suddenly gone dark and hard. “You may not know much about our abilities,
Captain
, but you do know Hagen has pulled us into messes like this for the past fewyears. What we didn’t know in the beginning, we’ve learned. And if that doesn’t convince you, I’ll tell you something else. I know exactly what those girls on the yacht are going through.
Exactly
. Because I’ve been there myself. Because my sister died at the hands of slavers. I could no more walk away from this ‘mess’ than I could stop breathing—and that goes for my friends here.”
    After a long moment Michael said, “I’m sorry. Ever since I found out Sutton had Lisa, all I’ve been able to think about is how responsible I am for it.” He sighed roughly. “But you’re right. All those girls have to be gotten off the yacht safely. And I can’t do it alone.” He looked at Robin, adding, “I’m sorry, Robin.”
    She didn’t return his gaze, but nodded slightly.
    Raven glanced at them curiously for a moment, then sat back in her chair. “We didn’t exactly come up with a plan,” she told Michael, “but we have started a couple of things in motion.”
    “What things?”
    Teddy answered. “Sutton will leave the yacht about midafternoon today. And it’s a good bet he’ll take at least a couple of his men when he goes.”
    “Goes?” Michael looked at them. “Goes where?”
    “He’ll have to take care of a business crisis,” Raven said limpidly.
    “How did you manage that?” Michael asked blankly.
    “It wasn’t too difficult. Dane found out that Sutton has a hell of a lot invested in various gambling parlors in Miami. It was fairly simple to gather all the addresses together and arrange to tip the police.”
    “It could be days before he’d find out,” Michael objected slowly.
    But Raven was shaking her head. “This time he’s going to hear about it by afternoon. Dane said you’d remember the man with the diamonds.” She waited for Michael’s nod, then continued. “It seems that man is a close friend of Sutton’s, and a business partner. Not publicknowledge, you understand. Dane had a game scheduled with him for tonight in one of Sutton’s places. Dane also has a trusted friend who’s going to get a message to Mr. Diamonds by lunchtime warning him that Dane’s heard all those parlors are going to be raided tonight. Mr. Diamonds, by the way, is in the habit of looking to Sutton for guidance, and he knows Sutton is aboard the
Dragon Lady
. He also knows where the yacht anchors, and Sutton’s emergency radio frequency.”
    Michael was impressed. In fact, he was delighted. “How on earth did you manage so much in just a few hours? And how, by the way, did you arrive here before us?”
    Kyle smiled at him. “We’ve been taught a number of devious tricks. We also have—between us—contacts all