Free Under the Moon Gate by Marilyn Baron Page A

frightening and familiar to her. It was the place her grandfather had taken her when he first taught her to swim, then to sail and to scuba dive. There was no way Nathaniel could have known that.
    Initially, Patience had been terrified of being out on the water, couldn’t keep anything down when she was out on the boat. She still wrestled with that fear. But her grandfather had pushed her to conquer her fears until he thought she had made a complete turnabout. He teased her and said she was like a fish in water—had called her his little mermaid. She and her grandfather had gone diving together in these reefs, looking for shipwrecks. There were hundreds of wrecks, dating back centuries.
    Conquer your fears. How many times had he told her that? Not just out on the water but on land, where he taught her to shoot, to defend herself, until she became an expert marksman, at home in any situation on land or in the sea.
    Whenever she recalled her grandfather, she remembered them walking together, or swimming together, her small, tentative hand in his large, capable one. But her grandfather was no longer here to keep her safe, and when she thought of going into the water without him, the color seeped out of her face.
    “You’ve been here before,” Nathaniel said, posing it as a statement, not a question.
    Patience turned toward him but refused to answer. She had questions of her own. “How did your uncle manage to get the chest to the surface?”
    “The chest had Nazi markings, so the crew was afraid it might contain an unexploded bomb. Divers went down and attached and inflated a flotation device to help get it to the surface. They took a cursory look inside, and when Downing saw the papers he dismissed the contents as having some historical significance but no monetary value. My uncle was a bit of a history buff, so when he expressed an interest in the chest, Downing turned it over to him. Years later, when I finally got a look inside, I saw the journal and your grandfather’s papers. They led me to you.”
    “You’re jumping to conclusions that my grandfather had anything to do with those papers,” she protested.
    “No, I have all the proof I need right here on this boat. Do you want to look inside the chest?”
    “I’m hungry,” Patience said, ignoring his question. “Do you have anything to eat?”
    “Sure.”
    She was anything but hungry after that big breakfast, but relief washed over her when Nathaniel left the subject of her grandfather’s past and stepped down into the galley. He brought back a hamper with a picnic lunch of cold chicken, a green bean salad, white wine, cheese, bread, and grapes.
    “I want you to eat,” Nathaniel prodded. “Captain’s rules.”
    Patience frowned, but she dug into the hamper to take her mind off her fears.
    “You’re looking a lot better since you’ve gotten some sleep and some food in your stomach,” he told her. “But you still look a little green around the gills. You need to put some meat on those bones, mate. If you don’t eat your vegetables, you’re going to get pellagra. That’s what my uncle always used to tell me.”
    “Spoken like a true sailor. You think I look bony?”
    “You could stand to fill out a little more,” Nathaniel said, “in some places. Here.” He traced a finger along her cheekbones. “And here.” His finger ran lightly down her arm and across her stomach.
    “In other departments, you’re built just fine.” His gaze focused on her breasts.
    Patience blushed. Nathaniel turned away before he could act on his instincts.
    They rested on deck. Nathaniel tried to lighten the mood. “You’re a funny little thing, Patience. I’ve already seen how you constantly bury your nose in some history book or historical romance. You’re obsessed with what was . You’re steeped in the past while you ought to have your eye on the future. You should be searching for what will be.”
    “Those are strange sentiments coming from a historian,”