TWICE A HERO By Susan Krinard

But now he wanted to see her. She nodded at the lieutenant and pulled the cloak more snugly across her chest. “Lead on, Mr. Harvey.”

“He’s coming, miss.” Mr. Harvey touched his cap again and discreetly retreated just as Liam came into view.

Strange. It must be a measure of how disoriented she was, this slight wobble in her legs, this leap of her heart when she saw him. Standing on the deck, legs braced and tawny hair whipped by the wind, he was magnificent. Magnificent in the way a pirate is: dangerous, undomesticated, and with a heart as implacable as a machete blade.

She gave him her coolest smile. “Well, Mr. O’Shea. Long time no see. I’m honored by your presence.”

His return smile was biting. “Was the voyage not to your liking? Perhaps you’d have preferred to stay in Guatemala?”

She studied what passed for the San Francisco skyline. “Not at all. It was very much to my liking.”

“And how does it feel to be home?”

“It’s not the city I left,” she admitted.

“In what way?”

“The full account would take quite a while. Let’s just say that my San Francisco is considerably more vertical and a lot less roomy. And that’s only from a distance.”

Voices rose among the ship’s crew as they prepared for docking. Wood creaked and water slapped. Liam leaned against the railing in a pose about as easy as that of a jaguar waiting to spring. “You did well on the journey, Mac. Better than I expected.”

Interesting. Such a compliment must have taken considerable effort on his part. “Your expectations were never very high,” she said, “but thank you, anyway.”

“You survived the jungle,” he went on, ignoring her sally, “but civilization can be a far deadlier place. God knows where you’d end up if you were left to fend for yourself. That is—” He looked back, gray eyes pinning her like a specimen on a board. “That is unless you have someone to go to.”

He meant Perry. Mac casually joined him at the rail. “I don’t know anyone in this San Francisco.”

The corner of his mouth lifted. “Of course not. So you’ll be entirely alone in a strange city.” He put his back to the railing, gaze hooded. “I find I can’t just leave you here as we agreed. If something happened to you, Mac, I doubt I could live with myself. I do owe you my life, after all.”

His words were merely badinage, and yet her heartbeat insisted on responding to the rough purr of his voice. “What did you have in mind?” she asked cautiously.

“Nothing improper, I assure you. The least I can do is see you settled comfortably so that you have all you need to… find your way home.”

“You’ll find me a place to stay?”

“More than that, Mac. Money, clothing—whatever you need. You’ll be well taken care of.”

“And what’s the catch?” she blurted out.

“No catch at all.”

That Mac seriously doubted, but she thought better of pressing him. Play it by ear. That was all she could do, and at the moment things were going as much her way as she dared to hope.

She and Liam stood side by side, within touching distance yet miles apart, and watched the ship glide among other steamers and great sailing vessels, lumber schooners and hay scows and swarms of smaller boats. Masts rose like a forest of small, bare trees. The wharf was chaotic with wagons and carriages and piles of crates and barrels and shouting stevedores.

Mac’s tension drained away as she took in the exotic sights and sounds. It was better than a movie, better than the best book. And she was right in the middle of it. San Francisco, greatest port city on the Pacific Coast. Born of the Gold Rush, fed by the Nevada silver strikes, made exotic by the Barbary Coast and Chinatown and over two hundred thousand souls of every race and heritage.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw the ship’s captain appear, and she heard Liam consult with him about dealing with customs and baggage and other details related to his shipping business. But her attention was wholly caught up in the miracle of the past. A past that was now her present, one which she’d soon become an actual, improbable part of.

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