The point was, it was a coin. The first coin. Though it was silver, not gold, and unidentifiable at the moment, she’d found it by herself.

Kate started to slip it into her goodie bag when her arm was jerked back.

The thrill of fear went wildly from her toes to her throat. The spear gun was on board the Vortex. She had no weapon. Before she could do more than turn in defense, she was caught by the shoulders with Ky’s furious hands.

Terror died, but the anger in his eyes only incited her own. Damn him for frightening her, for interfering. Shaking him away, Kate signaled for him to leave. With one arm, he encircled her waist and started for the surface.

Only once did she even come close to breaking away from him. Ky simply banded his arm around her again, more tightly, until she had a choice between submitting or cutting off her own air.

When they broke the surface, Kate drew in breath to shout, but even in this, she was out-maneuvered.

“Idiot!” he shouted at her, dragging her to the ladder. “One day off your back and you jump into forty feet of water by yourself. I don’t know why in hell I ever thought you had any brains.”

Breathless, she heaved her tanks over the side. When she was on solid ground again, she intended to have her say. For now, she’d let him have his.

“I take my eyes off you for a couple hours and you go off half-cocked. If I’d murdered Marsh, it would have been on your head.”

To her further fury, Kate saw that she’d boarded the Vortex. Marsh’s boat was nowhere in sight.

“Where’s the Gull?” she demanded.

“Marsh had the sense to tell me what you were doing.” The words came out like bullets as he stripped his gear. “I didn’t kill him because I needed him to come out with me and take the Gull back.” He stood in front of her, dripping, and as furious as she’d ever seen him. “Don’t you have any more sense than to dive out here alone?”

She tossed her head back. “Don’t you?”

Infuriated, he grabbed her and started to peel the wet suit from her himself. “We’re not talking about me, damn it. I’ve been diving since I was six. I know the currents.”

“I know the currents.”

“And I haven’t been flat on my back for a week.”

“I was flat on my back for a week because you were overreacting.” She struggled away from him, and because the wet suit was already down to her waist, peeled it off. “You’ve no right to tell me when and where I can dive, Ky. Superior strength gives you no right to drag me up when I’m in the middle of salvaging.”