the cabin, watching the rain that pummeled the porthole for a while, mesmerized by the brute force of the storm. I hoped the glass didn't pop out. That never happened. Did it?
Feeling my mouth go a little dry, I opened the minirefrigerator in search of water and came face-to-face with Griffin Ring's teak box, perched on a shelf between a tube of Fixodent and a bottle of prune juice. I blinked in surprise. Gee. What an odd place to hide a treasure. But when I eyeballed the safe above the refrigerator, I realized the box was too large to stow there, so the refrigerator was actually a brilliant place to hide it. Hmm. Had the girls found the correct pressure points to open it yet?
Sliding the box off the shelf, I walked to the sofa and sat down, cradling it in my hands. I shook it gently, listening to the mystery object rattle inside and wishing that I'd been born on the planet Krypton so I'd have X-ray vision. I slid my palm across the top and fingered the sharp-angled corners, but it remained as much a brick as it had earlier. I rattled it again. What in the world was in there?
Tap tap tap.
I sidled a look in the direction of the door. "Did you remember what you forgot?" I called out. Placing the box on the sofa cushion, I heaved myself to my feet.
"AAAGHHCKK!" Tilly cried as I passed the bathroom. WHOOOOSH went the toilet. Yup. Sounded as if she was still doing okay.
I pulled open the cabin door, grinning as I realized what Nana had probably forgotten. "Let me guess. You forgot your key --"
Pshhhhhhhhhht!
Pain seared my face and eyes, burning like liquid fire. "EHHH!" I screamed, clawing at my eyes. I ground my fists into my eye sockets, blinded. Then I felt the door slam me backward, driving my head into the wall like a well hit racquetball.
My life flashed before my eyes in that instant. The footlights of the Broadway stage. My marriage to Jack. Etienne's kiss in the Hotel Chateau Gutsch. The ghost in Ireland. My hair catching fire in Italy. Duncan's kiss in his little Speedo. And as I slid to the floor, I realized that if I had to live my life over again, there was only one thing I'd do differently.
I would have asked, "Who's there?" before answering the damn door.
Chapter 13
"Tilly was here when it happened, but she was mannin' the bathroom, so she didn't see nothin'."
Nana's voice floated toward me, distant and muffled, as if engulfed by fog.
"My granddaughter was collapsed on the floor when I come back. And the way she fell, she was blockin' the bathroom door, so I had to roll her over so's I could get Tilly out. You s'pose she got thrown against the wall and hit her head when the ship went off kilter? It couldn't a happened no more than fifteen minutes ago, but it scared me when I seen her passed out like that."
As I drifted slowly back to consciousness, instinct told me that I was flat on my back, on a surface that was softer than a floor. It also told me that I was better off unconscious, because the moment full awareness hit, so did the blistering pain. Air seethed through my teeth as I sucked down oxygen. "My eyes!" I fisted my hands against my eyelids, trying to scrub the sting away.
"Don't rub," a man instructed, tugging on my arm. "If you're experiencing eye irritation, rubbing will only make it worse."
"I can't help it!" I flapped my elbow to shoo him away and continued grinding my fists into my eyes, discovering only too late that constant rubbing made the pain worse. "Someone sprayed something into my face. It burns!" I heard heavy footsteps cross the floor, a rush of water in the bathroom sink, and the man's voice again, back at my side.
"Try this." He teased a wet cloth under my fingers. "Hold it against your eyes instead of rubbing."
The cloth momentarily eased the acid sting on my face and cooled the burn on my eyelids. I let out a relieved breath. "Bless you. That feels so much better."
"Can you tell me how you ended up on the floor?" the man asked. "I'm Dave Israelstam, by the way. Ship's doctor."
The incident replayed on the backs of my eyelids like a 3-D flick at an IMAX theater. "Someone knocked on the door. I answered it. I heard a hissing