Immortal Sea by Virginia Kantra Page A

thought, invulnerable. He surveyed her face. Her gaze was clear and fearless, her cheeks flushed with what might have been anger. But beneath the angle of her outthrust jaw, he caught again that tiny, betraying flutter of her pulse.
    “Is it the boy you’re protecting?” he murmured. “Or yourself?”

    Liz’s heart threatened to pound its way out of her chest.
    “Is it the boy you’re protecting? Or yourself?”
    Both, she thought desperately.
    “Zack, of course.”
    Well, it was half true, wasn’t it? She nudged Morgan out of the way with her hip and opened the freezer door. She needed to get a grip on the situation and herself. “The kids are waiting for their dessert. Why don’t you carry the ice cream out there while I make coffee?”
    She thrust the carton at him.
    His brows flickered upward. “You trust me alone with your children?”
    Not really. But she trusted herself alone with him even less.
    “I think you can deal with each other unsupervised for a few minutes,” she said, her tone as dry as his.
    She spooned coffee into a paper filter, trying to ignore the pounding in her blood and the trembling of her hands. She was not the kind of woman who quaked with lust. Not usually. Not since Copenhagen.
    Maybe stress and deprivation were finally getting to her.
    Or maybe Morgan was.
    He set the ice cream on the counter and came up behind her, moving silently and too close. “I am not finished. I want you.”
    Her breath backed up in her throat.
    “First lesson in parenting.” She flipped the switch on the coffeemaker and turned, leading with her elbow. He stepped back, avoiding a jab to his ribs. “What you want doesn’t come first anymore.”
    It was a good exit line. She grabbed four bowls and a handful of spoons and beat a retreat toward the dining room and safety.
    Emily leaned her head on her wrist, plowing tunnels through her rice and peas.
    Zack’s place was empty. Of course. She should have known he’d escape from the table the minute her back was turned.
    “Zack!” she called up the stairs. “Ice cream.”
    No answer.
    “Sulking,” Morgan observed.
    “Regrouping,” Liz corrected. “It’s been quite a day.”
    For all of them. And it wasn’t over yet.
    “Em, would you go upstairs and tell Zack it’s time for dessert?”
    Emily’s small face was tense, her gaze fixed on her plate. “He isn’t there.”
    She pressed her lips together in annoyance. “Well, wherever he is, can you tell him—”
    Emily looked up, her big eyes wide and clouded. “He went out.”
    A feeling tickled the back of Liz’s neck like a spider crawling along her hair line. “Out where?”
    Emily twisted, looking over her shoulder toward the front door.
    “Beneath the wave,” Morgan said.
    “What?”
    His face was grim. “I will go after him.”
    Liz quelled her unease. His urgency was infectious, but there was no point in overreacting. “That’s not necessary. He’s fifteen. It’s still light out. How much trouble can he . . .” Her voice trailed off.
    Morgan met her gaze. “Precisely.”
    Her heart hammered. “I’ll call his cell phone.”
    “Do as you wish. I am going to find him.”
    “You can’t. He left because of you.”
    Because he was hurting, angry, and confused, questioned by the police and confronted with his biological father. And she’d told him to get a job. She winced.
    “You give him too much credit,” Morgan said. “I doubt he is capable of rational thought. He is a young, rebellious male. He runs on instinct.”
    “Runs where?” She knelt by her daughter’s chair. “Em, honey, did Zack say anything about where he was going? When he’s coming back?”
    Emily’s lip trembled. She shook her head.
    Liz strode to the living room and dug in her bag for her phone.
    Morgan followed. “I need something that belongs to him. Something he sleeps with or wears next to his skin.”
    She lowered the phone from her ear. “Why?”
    “You are wasting time.” Morgan’s gaze