Free Dark Abyss by Kaitlyn O'Connor Page B

her out to sink or swim?
    Simon seemed damned eager to get rid of her, and she had the bad feeling that whatever he decided was decided for all of them, privately as well as professionally.
    She’d tended to think of Caleb almost as if he was Sir Galahad because he’d seemed sympathetic and understanding from the beginning, almost protective, but she thought it was probable that he’d only been playing ‘good cop’.
    It was a crying damned shame she was such a dumbass that she’d picked a fight with Simon instead of saying something clever and suggestive, such as ‘Are you going to breathe for me on the way back?’. She honestly couldn’t picture herself carrying anything like that off, though. And it probably would’ve scared the piss out of her if he’d taken her up on it, if it came to that.
    He was a scary man. There must be something wrong with her to want to play with fire! He was out of her league on too many levels to count.
    She still hadn’t managed to banish her disappointment when Caleb and Joshua arrived to collect her, but their appearance brought her fears to a head. Her stomach cramped and she couldn’t blame it entirely on her anxiety about climbing into a coffin equipped with a propeller.
    Caleb entered the room dangling her nightgown from one finger and her panties from another. “You want to put your own clothes back on?”
    She sent him a drop dead look, stalked across the room, and snatched her clothes from him. “So I can run around the city in my nightclothes? I don’t think so! I’m taking the damned robe! You can have it back when I … we … get to my place where I can dress.”
    He shrugged, grinning at her a little lopsidedly. “I liked the way you looked in it.
    What’s wrong with it? It’s dry now.”
    She gaped at him, trying to decide whether to ask him if he’d liked the way it looked wet or dry. As thin as it was, it probably hadn’t covered much when it was wet.
    She felt her face heat just thinking about asking, though, and she decided against it. “It’s for sleeping. People don’t usually run around in public in the clothes they sleep in,” she muttered.
    “You sleep in clothes? Why?”
    He wasn’t feigning flabbergasted, she saw. “Because … just because,” she retorted. Because she was more comfortable when she was covered up and because when she was naked she was too aware of every brush against her skin. Because she didn’t enjoy looking at herself and she feared being looked at by anyone else. And it just plain felt indecent!
    She realized she envied their complete comfort in their own skin, but she supposed they had every reason to be confident and it seemed doubtful they had ever known it any other way. Their living quarters were like anybody else’s, but just going about their daily lives meant that they were in and out of the sea all day long, and that wasn’t even counting those who worked outside—like Caleb and Simon. They probably got tired of dragging the robes on and off, which would explain why they dispensed with them regularly.
    It presented her with an interesting question. If they were so accustomed to nudity, did they actually pay any attention to it? She hadn’t been able to get her mind off of it, partly because they were all just plain gorgeous, but also because the sight of naked flesh was completely alien to her—almost. It sent a jolt through her every time and it took her several minutes to recover from it and even try to behave ‘normally’.
    She saw when she emerged from her thoughts that Caleb was still looking at her questioningly. “Because it’s the custom on the surface and it’s what I’m used to.”
    “So it … bothers you that we don’t wear anything?”
    “I didn’t say that.”
    “But it does, doesn’t it?”
    “No, no! It really doesn’t!” she lied, wishing he would drop the subject.
    He frowned. “I was thinking about trying to talk you into stopping by the station to give us some