by C J Schnier
Our drinks arrived and I put a crisp one-hundred dollar bill down on the bar. Both Jaye's and the bartender's eyebrows raised. The latter swiped it up and headed for the cash register.
"I take it he paid you, then?" she asked.
"He did," I confirmed. "And here's your half." I handed her a small blue drybag I picked up earlier in West Marine. "One hundred-and-fifty thousand dollars."
Jaye took the bag, her smile broadening. "That's a good start," she said.
"What do you mean?" I asked. "That was our deal, we split it fifty-fifty."
"But you still owe me a plane."
"Oh come on!" I cried in exasperation, "Not that again. I rescued you from Bardales, that has to count for something."
"I wouldn't have needed rescuing if you hadn't destroyed my plane," she retorted.
"I didn't destroy it. I disabled it," I countered. "Bardales destroyed it."
"And because you disabled it, it got destroyed. It's your fault."
"Fine. I destroyed it," I said giving in.
"Then, the way I see it, you owe me," she said.
I nodded my head, reached in my pocket, and pulled out a small glass vial. I placed it on the bar in front of her. Curiously, she picked it up and peered inside at several specks of gold.
"What's this?" She asked.
"I'm not buying you a new plane, but maybe you can use this to start looking for a one."
"Where the hell did you get this?" she muttered.
"I came across a stream full of flecks like this when I was following you to the cave. I threw a few in my pocket just in case you got the idol before I did."
She shook the vial and then deftly slipped it into her pocket. "Well, that's a good start to paying off your debt," she said.
"I'm not giving you my money, so is there some other way I can work off my debt?" I asked, giving her my best wink.
A sly and cunning look overtook her face. "I can think of a few things you could do," she replied, returning my wink.
"When would you like me to start 'repaying' you?" I asked, playing along.
"How about right now," she said, grabbing my hand and leading me towards the exit.
BOCA CIEGA CHASE
An excerpt from the next Chase Hawkins novel
I wasn’t on the run from the law, but I didn’t have any use for it either. My life for the last few years had taken some wild and expected paths. Most of which put me on the wrong side of right. And now? Now I was heading back to where it all began. Gulfport, Florida. Things were going to change. I just thought it would be me that would change and not the town. I was wrong.
After two perfect, sunny days of sailing from The Keys, I anchored my boat, Paramour. She bobbed happily in the emerald green waters of Boca Ciega Bay, a couple hundred feet outside of a brand new mooring field. The city must have installed it recently. It wasn’t there when I had left. Boats occupied less than half the spaces in the field, perhaps ten in total. Around the perimeter, like an armada blockading a port, were dozens of anchored boats.
It was Saturday, and the bay was busy. Powerboats zipped through the mooring field at full speed. Behind them, they left a sea of rolling masts in their wake. To the east, a handful of two-manned sailboats zig zagged across the bay. They dodged anchored vessels while they engaged in some friendly competition. Over to the west, I could see the Starlight Princess, a dinner cruise boat, plowing its way through the ICW.
Gulfport’s town dock was in total chaos. A mass of powerboats circled like buzzards, waiting for one of the town’s free slips to open up. Roughly every half-hour, a boatload of beer clutching drunks would stumble out of the bars. They would make their way down the long pier, back to their boat, and speed off across the bay. Their vacant space taken by whichever boat could force their way in the fastest.
Darting through the boats were the liveaboards and their dinghies. They came and went from the overcrowded floating dock on the backside of the boat slips. The dock resembled a never-ending game of bumper boats as they came and went. The overcrowding had forced me to climb through two other dinghies to get to shore. Now, by the looks of it, there were even more small boats jammed against each other now. This was not the place to be if I needed to make a quick getaway. That much was obvious.
Except for the same patrol car cruising the main strip along the waterfront every five minutes, I hadn’t seen a single cop. Half a dozen potential BUIs left the docks every hour. Dozens of boats, one after another, broke the no-wake laws. Yet there was no police presence on the water. Even the FWC was absent. It was a far cry from Boot Key Harbor in Marathon, where I had based myself for the past few years.
I watched the chaos from a newly constructed and elevated brick walkway. Like the mooring field, it had not existed since the last time I was here. It ran the length of the beach from the Casino pier in the center of town to the municipal pier. A distance of a couple thousand feet. It spanned the entire eastern side of the waterfront bar district. A stainless steel guard rail prevented access to the beach. But, it served as a fantastic leaning post. It was here that I watched the shit-show that was the town docks.
I turned my thin plastic cup up, killing the rest of my drink. It was time to get a refill from one of my favorite old haunts. Except, like so much of the town, it wasn’t the same either. Manatees was gone. In its place was Caddy’s. It looked almost exactly the same as Manatees, except the beautiful mural of a family of manatees on the side of the building was now little more than an ugly advertisement for the new establishment.
It was early still, and the band was carrying in their equipment when I walked through the roll-up metal doors on Caddy’s ground floor. Brushing past a few patrons, I elbowed my way to the packed bar. The bartender was swamped, and I knew it was only going to get worse once the music started. I waited my turn as she mixed drinks and poured beers, working her way around the bar.
Someone bumped into me hard, knocking me off balance and taking my place. A stench of stale beer and body odor followed him, assaulting my nose. His face was as rough as his smell, pockmarked and covered with an unkempt, patchy beard. Greasy black hair drooped to his shoulders, hiding some scars on his cheek.
He slapped two crumpled dollars and a fistful of change on the bar. I let his transgression slide and tried my best to ignore the smell. Just another drunk looking for his fix. I’d seen plenty of them down in The Keys. I’d been one for a while.
The pretty blonde bartender finally worked her way to my section. She took one look at the drunk next to me, ignored him, and introduced herself to me.
“Hi there! I’m Christina. What can I get for you?” She asked with a bubbly voice, bending at the waist and leaning on the bar, giving me a view down her t-shirt. A view she had enhanced by cutting away the collar and making a large V that ended somewhere above her navel.
I averted my eyes. Not that I didn’t appreciate the view, but the girl was half my age, and looking made me feel like a creepy old man. Staring her in the eyes, I opened my mouth to order another rum drink.
A blur of movement next to me and the drunk’s hand shot out, seizing Christina’s wrist. She snatched her hand back, trying to break free. But the man’s grip was too strong.
“That ain’t right. You jus’ gonna skip over me like that?” he asked, spittle flying from his rancid mouth.
“Get off me,” Christina shrieked, struggling against him.
“Hey! Fella!” I said, yelling at the man. “You’d better take it on down the road before there is trouble.”
“You stay out of this!” He spat back at me. “All I want is a drink, and this bitch skipped me. She did it on purpose too.”
Throughout the bar, dozens of faces turned to watch us. Behind me, two people backed away, carrying their drinks to safety. An unsettling hush fell over the bar as everyone waited to see what would happen.
“I’ll tell you what. If you let go of her and promise to leave, I’ll buy you a drink. How’s that sound?” I asked, trying t
o diffuse the situation.
“Sounds to me like you’s an asshole,” the drunk said. He dropped the bartender’s wrist and squared up against me.
“You don’t want to do this,” I warned. He wasn’t a big man. I outweighed him by thirty pounds. If it came to blows, I was confident that I could take him. I just hoped that he would see reason and back down.
“Yeah, I think I do,” he replied, raising his hand and poking me in the chest. “You jus’ gotta go stickin’ yer nose where it don’t belong,” he slurred.
“Last chance, guy. It’s your choice, a free drink or an asswhopping.”
Someone from the crowd yelled, “Kick his ass, seabass!”
He poked me in the chest again. “Fuc...”
I never let him finish. I snapped my arm out, seizing his wrist and yanking the drunkard toward me. Twisting, I locked his now outstretched arm. With my other hand, I grabbed a handful of his greasy hair and slammed his head down onto the top of the bar and held it there.
A muffled “Oof,” escaped him, barely audible over the collective gasp of the crowd. He struggled against me for a moment, kicking and trying to work his arm free, getting angrier and angrier. But it was no use. I had him pinned.
“So, you like grabbing women? Does that make you feel tough?” I asked him.
“Screw you,” he growled.
I twisted his arm harder and then picked his head up and slammed it back down on the bar again. “What was that?”
“Nothin’,” he groaned through gritted teeth. “I won’t do it again man, jus’ lemme go.”
“Are you going to apologize to the nice lady?” I asked reproachfully.
“Yeah, yeah, alright. I’m sorry. Please, just let me go,” he pleaded.
“What do you think, Christina? Should I let him go or wait for the cops?” I asked, looking up.
Christina stared down at the drunk unblinking, her mouth hanging open. Alternating red and blue lights were already flashing in the mirrored beer signs. Within seconds, two patrol cars converged on the corner of the bar. I recognized one vehicle from earlier, but the other, a newer Dodge Charger, I hadn’t seen yet. Two officers leapt from their vehicles. Both wore bulletproof vests and dark blue uniforms. The crowd did its best to part as they pushed through.
Before they got to the bar, I released my opponent. But first, I leaned down and whispered into his ear. “I don’t want to see you around here anymore. And I sure as hell better not hear about you getting physical with any of these girls again.”
“Or what?” The man spat, unable to swallow his pride.
“Or the cops will be the last of your worries.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Captain CJ Schnier is the author of several books including the beloved Chase Hawkins Adventure Series which includes his upcoming novel Unlawful Chase. He also writes nautical horror and has been known to dabble into other genres as well.
CJ lives and writes from his sailboat moored in downtown St. Petersburg, Florida, and spends his free time sailing the waters of Tampa Bay and the Gulf Coast of Florida. When not on the water, a rarity, he can often be found enjoying a fresh-caught grouper sandwich while enjoying a cold beer at a local tavern.
With nearly twenty-five years experience on the water from from fishing to boat deliveries, search and rescue to transporting barges of oil, he has amassed a lifetime of stories told by a colorful cast of characters. It is these experiences that he draws on the create the nautical stories that he writes. Many of the characters from his adventure books, as well as their backgrounds, are based on friends and acquaintances, proof that sometimes reality can be stranger than fiction.
Follow CJ at www.cjschnier.com