Free In Rides Trouble by Julie Ann Walker Page A

slipped, jerking him hard against the railing until all he could do was grit his teeth and hang on. Just when he thought he might lose her for real, Bill and Angel were there beside him, reaching over the top rung and grabbing her legs.
    Thank you, thank you, thank you, dear sweet Lord…and Bill and Angel.
    Only when Becky was safely in her brother’s arms, Bill crooning, “You’re okay. We gotcha,” did Frank manage to uncurl his fingers from their death grip around her slim ankle.
    Interesting. He had absolutely no feeling in that hand.
    Staggering back, he glanced up to see Angel quartering the sea below with his M4. After a few moments, the guy turned with a shrug, “I don’t know. Maybe the fall stunned him, and he drowned. I can’t see…oh, um, Boss?”
    “Yeah?” Frank frowned at Angel’s strangely apprehensive face.
    “That, um, that does not look too good.” He pointed at Frank’s right arm.
    Frank glanced down and noticed, with a sort of odd detachment, that his hand was dangling at an unnatural angle against his thigh.
    “Dislocated,” he said, not giving a rat’s ass about his arm. All that mattered was Becky. That she was safe…
    “I think it’s more than that,” Angel murmured, then suddenly spun on his heel, racing back to the railing.
    A grumbling roar managed to split through the loud ringing in Frank’s ears, then Angel was discharging his weapon. The harsh thump, thump, thump of the M4 sounded curiously muted, and no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t seem to remember what the guy was shooting at.
    Angel swung around a few moments later, his face fixed in hard lines. “So he didn’t drown. He’s on the catamaran, and I managed to take out one engine, but”—he shook his head—“he’s too far out of range now.”
    Ah, yes. Sharif—that asshole. That’s what Angel was shooting at. Now he remembered…
    “Call it in,” he instructed, wondering why it sounded like he was talking through a tunnel.
    “That’s a pretty bad bump on your head, Boss,” Bill said, and when Frank turned to glance at him, the guy’s face looked all wonky. “You’re bleeding like a stuck pig.”
    I am?
    “Frank?” Becky stepped toward him, her gorgeous brown eyes dark with worry inside a face that was as funky-looking as Bill’s.
    He didn’t care. She was still beautiful and, more importantly, she was safe. And when she said his name, Frank , in that dusky voice, he wanted to whoop with joy. Oh, how he’d missed the sound of her—
    Whoa.
    Why the hell was the deck suddenly rushing up to meet him?
    ***
    Wowza. Whoever came up with the expression, “falling like a ton of bricks,” must’ve seen something very similar to Frank’s nose dive into the Hamilton ’s deck. Becky dropped to her knees beside him, calling his name, but he was out cold. Stone cold. The gash along his hairline leaked thick rivulets of dark blood all over his pale face and onto the deck.
    This was bad. This was real bad.
    Losing consciousness after a head injury was a sure sign of concussion, and she knew from the elementary medical training she’d received from Steady, a concussion could sometimes turn deadly. You could just slip into a sleep from which there was no return…
    “Frank,” she whispered his name, gently shaking his good shoulder as anguish burned up the back of her throat like nitric acid. “Wake up now, Frank. You’re too tough to let something like a bump on the head bring you down.”
    Nothing. Not so much as a twitch.
    Oh God. If he died while saving her, she’d never forgive herself. She’d never—
    No. No way. He wasn’t going out like that. Not the legendary Boss Knight.
    “Frank,” she nudged him harder, pressing the gauze pad Angel handed her against the deep cut on his forehead. The tears she’d been holding at bay for nearly a week finally burst through the emotional barriers she’d erected, flowing hot and salty down her cheeks as her racing heart threatened to shatter into