Love Overboard - By Janet Evanovich Page 0,19

of her gliding through the black water.

Stephanie felt as if she were glowing from head to toe. She’d never experienced anything like her moonlight swim, and she’d never had a man care enough about her to dry her hair. It wasn’t just lust between them, she thought happily. He liked her. And she liked him. She reached for her mug of coffee and stared at the pies sitting on the countertop. She counted them twice. “There’s a pie missing.”

“Are you sure?”

“I could guarantee it. I gave these pies four of the best hours of my life. Man, this is the pits. A pienapper! How low can you go?”

“Maybe we should look on the positive side. At least they’re not afraid to try your cooking.”

She gave him a warning wrinkle of her nose. “You want to elaborate on that?”

Ivan grinned at her. “Not me. I try not to get drop-kicked more than once a day.”

Stephanie grimaced. “I can’t believe I did that.”

“Now I know how you kept your virginity for so long.”

“I was an undercover narcotics cop for eight years, and that’s the first time I’ve ever had to use self-defense to keep my pants on.” Ivan didn’t say anything, but Stephanie suspected he was thinking of more practical methods of removing her clothes. Their gazes held for a long moment, until Stephanie sighed in defeat, acknowledging that she’d only prolonged the inevitable. Sooner or later, he was going to get her naked—or more than likely, she was going to get herself naked. She decided to change the subject and make him a peace offering. “Could I interest you in some pie?”

Ten minutes later they were sitting at the heavy oak table enjoying warm blueberry pie, when someone knocked on the closed hatch cover. “Anybody home?” a female voice called. “Do I smell fresh coffee and hot blueberry pie?”

A second female passenger made her way down the ladder. “Blueberry pie! Yum!”

Mr. and Mrs. Pease joined them along with several other people. Stephanie put another pot of coffee on to drip and brought out more plates.

“You know who would love this?” Mrs. Pease said. “Lena Neilson and her cabin mate, Elsie. Do you think I should go get them?”

“Yes,” Stephanie said, “and you could see if Mr. Kramer and Mr. and Mrs. Dembrowski are awake.” She cut two more pies into wedges, set them on the table, and returned to the stove.

Ivan stood beside her, slouched against the wood cabinet. “You like this, don’t you?”

Stephanie laughed. “It’s hard work being a ship’s cook, but it’s fun.” She wiped her hands on her clean sweats, never thinking about the new blueberry stains she was acquiring. When she spoke she kept her voice low so the conversation didn’t carry past Ivan. “I was a narc for a long time, and my world was really very small. My work environment was frantic. The station house was noisy and chaotic, with a bunch of dedicated, underpaid, overworked cops living on candy bars and coffee. When I wasn’t at the station house, I was in a school that was even noisier and more chaotic. After a while you get to thinking all of it is normal. You wonder if the whole world lives on fast food and works eighteen-hour days.”

“What about your family and friends outside of work? What about those Sunday chicken dinners?”

Stephanie cut another pie while she talked. “I had personal reasons for becoming a cop, but once I started working, the personal reasons weren’t important anymore. It was the kids who were important. I liked them. They needed help. They needed someone to get the pushers far away from them. They needed education. They needed enough confidence in themselves not to succumb to peer pressure. It wasn’t as if I was God and could solve all those problems, but I made a small contribution. Anyway, it was very consuming. I visited my family, but I lived in the high school hallways. Then I woke up one day, looked in the mirror, and realized I was getting too old to pass for a teenager.”

There was a lot more to it than that, but she didn’t feel like relating it. They’d moved her from one school to another, prolonging her career. In the end, she’d almost been killed because she hadn’t been smart enough to quit while she was ahead.

She shrugged away the memory of it. Almost killed didn’t count, she told herself. Everything had worked out okay, and here she was, cutting pie.

“I’ve missed a