Prologue

The Gulf Coast stretches from Florida to the Mexican border and offers access to the world for many of the southern states. However west of the Mississippi and the city of New Orleans, there are very few natural ports. There is, however, one sliver of an island that provides entree to the broad Gulf on one side and a protected bay on the other. Gulf City started as a small fishing hamlet and grew due to the bounty found in the waters surrounding the island. Once docks were built, ships started using the port to deliver goods to areas west of the Mississippi and to collect the yield from the farms and ranches in the area. Fortunes soon started to amass and a city grew. The scattering of small wooden buildings disappeared as a proper city started to grow in their place. Near the docks, a large warehouse district was built. It was here that the cotton, rice, grain and other bounties of the land were stored before they were loaded on ships for sale around the world. These warehouses also collected bananas, tea and all the goods the world could offer to Gulf City and its surrounds. After a time, the fishing hamlet was completely gone, replaced with warehouses and a free-for-all commercial district that met the needs of everyone from the bankers to the sailors coming off the ships.

Chapter 1

No matter what position I turned, my body could never quite get comfortable. For what seemed like hours, my mind pitched around in a state between sleep and consciousness. In fitful dreams I tried to leave work but every door just led to another room and I could not find my way home before fading back into darkness. Then I was trying to swim to shore, but the current kept pulling me further out into the gulf and the beach kept receding in the distance until the deep warm water pulled me under. Finally one eye cracked open and absorbed the red glow creeping around a window shade. At first I could not figure out where I was, but soon the dark shadows formed into the recognizable shapes of my boarding house room. Then the solution to another mystery revealed itself—why my bed seemed so uncomfortable. The edge of the steel frame was pressing through the thin mattress and into my spine because another person had staked claim to most of the bed. Not knowing exactly who this squatter was, I reached over to find round hips and silky thighs. Disturbed from her sleep, my guest turned over on her back and her blonde wavy hair caught the sunlight that leaked through the yellowed window shade.