Treasure of the Deep by Aiden James, J. R. Rain

just speak to my heart’s desire and biggest fantasy? Hot damn!
    “If it turns out half as easy as it sounds, we might just have something worth celebrating soon,” I whispered to Ishi. He nodded eagerly. He must have needed a drink worse than me.
    Or not.
    Norema had wept throughout our gondola trip, and surely her tears were a mixture of sadness and joy for those she’d lost and the reunion with her boy. As I watched her up ahead, she turned to look at me...and I almost wish she hadn’t done so. Her eyes spoke for her, telling me that despite her joy in finding her son we had made a grave mistake coming here, and where we were heading next might prove to be even worse for all of us in the end. The painful regret in her eyes said so, and it matched the growing dread in my gut.
    I’d already figured the easy way wouldn’t be our destined path—it almost never is. It had definitely not been that way for Ishi or me since we encountered Marie Da Vinci. Our hurried flight halfway across the world might’ve been more fortuitous if an engine had blown and we plunged into the Pacific, or even into the Bay of Bengal before we reached Bangalore. I regretted more than ever not listening to my own gut instinct about taking the fateful flight to this island, and worse yet, ignoring Ishi’s dream premonition warning us to wait a few days—that I’d told him to shut the hell up about it at the small Indian coastal airport.
    “Something will make sense in a few days, if we wait here first.” That was what he’d told me as we loaded our gear onto the puddle-jumper that was hardly suitable for the trip to the southern most reaches of the Maldivian chain.
    My response had been rude and curt. Basically, typical Nick Caine. Now I regretted not listening. Damn my stubbornness.
    But, in my defense, it had sounded like a bullshit reason to wait. I wanted to get here, scope out some supposedly long, lost treasure, then enjoy some downtime with Marie before heading off to Egypt to fulfill an old promise to my buddy Mario. A promise I made to him while he lay dying in my arms from a bullet fired by Marie’s wicked uncle so long ago. My haste fueled a series of foolhardy actions, and now, obviously, it was too damned late to turn back and start over.
    I shook my head again at my own folly and looked over my shoulder into the darkness. The waterfall sounded louder for some reason, even though we were steadily moving farther away.
    “We are here!” Aafreen called to us, lowering his voice but projecting well enough for Ishi and me to hear him. “We’ll help you tie the boats and then we’ll need to move quickly to reach the tunnel behind Badri’s compound. It will be our last one to go through, and then we’ll be back in daylight...”
    His voice trailed off, and he whipped his head in the direction he had pointed to a moment before. At first, I heard nothing above the din of the water crashing less than a hundred yards behind me. I still didn’t hear anything to worry about, until I saw the first halogen beam moving toward us from the area ahead of Aafreen.
    I immediately grabbed Ishi’s arm, to get him to help me turn the gondola around. No, it wasn’t cowardice or a vain instinct to save only my own skin and his. I had hoped that everyone else would follow our lead, and we could avoid our pursuers who had obviously figured out where we were headed and had cut us off. But, before we turned our boat around to head into the dangerous darkness, I heard three clicks in succession. These were followed by more halogens that suddenly appeared next to us across the waterway. Two more clicks and we now had at least five bright beams pointed at us. I couldn’t make out a damned thing behind them...including the assholes holding the flashlights.
    “ I believe this belongs to you, Nicholas Alexander Caine,” said a deep male voice. The English carried a rich Indian accent, and the tone revealed amusement.
    “ What belongs to me? And