ALLIE BATEMAN WAS SCARED out of her wits, but she was trying hard not to show it. She’d been warned about living alone on the Dragonfly, warned that beach communities drew predators as well as tourists. But she hadn’t actually believed anything bad would happen to her until now.

These guys shouldn’t have felt menacing in their GQ weekend casual clothes. But there was something about the man in front-a keen determination in the thrust of his jaw-that made her uneasy.

He seemed to shake himself. “Who are you?”

At least her uninvited guests didn’t appear to be set on immediate raping and pillaging, so Allie changed tack. “I’m Allie Bateman. Are you looking for a fishing charter?” No sense driving away perfectly good business, if that’s what it was. These guys for sure weren’t local, not with those clothes and Yankee accents. Were they here for a wild weekend of drinking and womanizing?

She studied the leader of the pack again. He didn’t look the type to overindulge. His body showed no signs of softness, no paunch from too many three-martini lunches and fatty steaks.

The man returned her scrutiny. “No, we’re not here to book a charter.”

“Then why are you on my boat?” Prickles of apprehension tickled her scalp, and this time it had nothing to do with fear of bodily harm.

“The question isn’t what we’re doing on your boat, it’s what are you doing on ours? I’m Cooper Remington, and these are my cousins Reece and Max. This is Johnny Remington’s boat, right?”

Her heart still squeezed painfully every time she thought of Johnny, of how valiantly he fought his illness right down to the end, how he never complained about the pain though she knew it must have been horrific. Then the interloper’s name registered.