by Evan Graver
“Hey, honey!” Karen called as she caught a rope he tossed down.
“How was the diving?”
“It was wonderful. I love this part of the Caribbean.”
“I’ve got some bad news.”
“What?” she asked, busying herself with handing up diving gear.
“As soon as we have the Zodiac onboard, we’re heading for Haiti.”
“What for?”
“Ryan Weller is going there.”
Karen looked up from the boat, shading her eyes with her hand. She smiled. Kilroy wondered if it was a smile to cover her sadness at leaving Colombia or her anticipation of seeing Ryan again. Jealousy and anger surged through Kilroy at the thought of Ryan even being near his wife. It was a strange feeling he couldn’t explain, but it strengthened his resolve to force Ryan Weller to recover his gold and then to end the insufferable bastard’s life.
Chapter Eight
Ryan was glad to get out of the Kia, which he’d decided should be Killed in Action to match the military’s acronym. He stretched his arms and legs and jogged in place for thirty seconds. If the Kia was KIA, then he was DOA, Dead on Arrival. Travis and Stacey were climbing out of the GMC when Captain Dennis Law came down the gangplank to meet them.
“Welcome back,” Dennis said, extending his hand.
Ryan grasped it. “Thanks, Captain.”
“Who do you have here?” Dennis asked, indicating Travis and Stacey.
Ryan made the introductions. “We would have been here sooner, but it took Stacey a long time to pack.” He’d followed them to her apartment and tried to hurry them along, but she had kicked him out and Ryan had waited in the car. When Stacey and Travis had finally come out, they were both flushed from physical activity and it wasn’t hard to guess what they’d done.
“I’ve got a mate aboard already, miss,” Dennis said. “You don’t by chance cook do ya?”
Stacey gave the older man a quizzical expression and shook her head.
“She’d burn water, Captain,” Ryan said. He slung a pack over his shoulder and grabbed the rebreather. He headed up the gangway and nearly collided with an old man with wispy white hair under a black-knit watch cap.
“Watch where ya be goin’, sonny.” He spat a stream of tobacco juice over the rail. A brown streak from the corner of his mouth to his chin marred a scraggly, white beard.
“My apologies, sir.”
“Don’t call me, sir, I work for a living.”
“Leave the boy alone, Emery,” Dennis said. “He’s the new boss.”
“Pardon me, there, sonny,” Emery touched his cap with a knurled finger.
Ryan grinned. “No worries, Emery.”
“Just cause you the boss don’t mean you can call me by my Christian name, boy.”
“What should I call you?” Ryan asked.
“Well, boy, you can call me Mr. Ducane.” A broad smile crept across the wizened man’s face.
“Stop giving him a ration,” Dennis chided.
“I think we should just call him Grandpa,” Stacey said.
“Lookie here, a little girl with a sassy mouth.”
Dennis said, “Stop harassing the help, Emery,”
“Where are we going to bunk, Grandpa?” Ryan flashed Emery a grin.
Emery turned and led the way below deck. He mumbled, “Ya can sleep in the bleedin’ bilge.”
Ryan dropped his gear in one of the small bunkrooms. He turned to ask Travis if he wanted the second bunk, but Travis was in the room across the passageway with Stacey. They had their arms around each other and their tongues down each other’s throats. Ryan shook his head and headed out to grab more gear from the car. It took him two more trips and a half an hour to get everything stowed the way he wanted, then he made his way topside to find Dennis.
The captain and Emery were standing behind the bridge structure, looking at a round, metal tank approximately ten feet long and six feet high. Mounted to the side of the tank were a series of large face gauges above a tangle of pipes, levers, valves, and smaller gauges. Ryan walked to the end and stuck his head through the open hatch. He’d been in quite a few recompression chambers, but this was the smallest, accommodating only two people. There was an airlock on the side for passing in food and drink and thin padding over steel benches. Gray oxygen masks lay on the seats. He pulled his head out and looked over at Dennis. “Nice piece of history you’ve got here.”
“She may be old, but she’ll do. I’ve kept her serviced. Got records all the way back to the day I bought her from the Navy yard in ninety-eight.”
“You was a whippersnapper back then, sonny,” Emery said to Ryan.
“Where’d you dig up this fossil, Captain?” asked Ryan, indicating the first mate.
“I’ve known Emery most of my life,” Dennis said. “He’s been crewing for me off and on for the better part of thirty years.”
“I hope he does something other than harass the help,” Travis said, coming up beside Ryan.
“Don’t worry,” Dennis said. “Emery can outcook most people. Plus, he can dive, work tender, and drive the boat.”
Emory aimed his beard at Ryan. “What are you bringing to the party, whippersnapper?”
Ryan folded his arms and leaned against the chamber. “I bring the financing, the coordinates for the dive site, and I’m a diver and tender as well.” He nodded at Travis. “Travis is a commercial diver, he knows surface supply and can act as a tender.”
“What about the girl?” Dennis almost whispered.
“She’s certified to drive a one-hundred-ton vessel and she’ll learn to tender. She’s a dive instructor as well.”
“Fine and dandy.” Emery spit over the rail.
“Your health going to hold out for this trip, Grandpa?” Travis asked.
“Boy, you better mind your elders,” Emery snapped. Turning to Ryan, he said, “I hear we’re going to Haiti.”
Ryan looked hard at the old man. This was a battle of wills. The younger generation against the older, and the sooner they settled down and began working as a crew, the better off they would be. “Don’t be spreading it around.”
“I know how to keep my mouth shut, boy. I’ve been chasing treasure in these waters for damned near fifty years.”
Ryan asked Dennis, “Did you tell him what’s at stake?”
Dennis said quietly, “I told him we were going to Haiti on a salvage mission.”
“Looks more like a circus,” Emery said, staring at Stacey, who was coming up the gangway with her duffle bag.
“Look,” Ryan said. “We can stand here and bicker and banter all day, but we’ve got work to do. I don’t want this shit floating around when we’ve got a man at three hundred feet.”
“Yes, sir,” Emery replied, pulling his cap off his head. His unruly hair stuck out at all angles.
Dennis nodded, and Travis said, “Yeah, I’m good as long as Grandpa is, eh?”
Emery held up a bony fist. “I oughta take you over my knee.”
“Dammit, Travis, knock it off,” Ryan said.
Travis laughed. “Emery, I like you. You remind me of my grandpa, and I call you that as a sign of respect.”
Emery nodded and pulled his watch cap back on. “I’m honored, son.”
Ryan pulled out a cigarette.
“If you light that thing by my recompression chamber, I will take you over my knee,” Emery declared.
Ryan paused and knitted his brow.
Emery pointed. “Don’t tell me you can’t see them no smokin’ signs by the oxygen tanks.”
Ryan turned and looked at the row of tall, green cylinders chained and bolted between the recompression chamber and the back of the bridge. A large No Smoking sign hung above them.
“You want to smoke, do it on the fan tail.” Emery pointed at the back of the boat.
“Fan tail,” Ryan mused. “Now I’m certain you were in the Navy.”
Emery nodded. “Got out as a senior chief bosun’s mate after twenty-five yea
rs.”
Ryan looked over the boat’s rear rail at the thick tires hanging by chains. They were cracked and faded, some missing their tread, and the chains were rusty. He lit his cigarette. “You didn’t happen to meet a guy by the name of Henry O’Shannassy?”
“What’d he do?” Emery asked.
“He was a senior chief back in the day. Spent most of his time as a diver; runs a marina in North Carolina now.”
Emery shook his head. “Can’t say that I knew him.”
Ryan took a deep drag from his Camel. He needed to quit again. His lungs didn’t ache quite as bad when he wasn’t huffing carbon monoxide.
“What’s the plan?” Dennis asked, leaning against the rail. Stacey and Travis joined the three men.
“I have a plane load of gear coming in from Dark Water Research,” Ryan said. “They’re also sending one of their mechanics to go over all your systems and gear.” Dennis started to speak, but Ryan cut him off, glancing around the long-neglected boat. “I can see that everything is in perfect condition, but let’s let him do his job. We have a long voyage to a foreign port where we don’t know how much support we’ll have in getting spare parts, or even diesel. We may have to go in and out of the Dominican Republic just to get fuel.”
Dennis scratched his beard and looked annoyed. “I know you’re trying to be sarcastic about my boat, but she’s in good shape.”
“We agreed,” Ryan said.
Dennis scratched his chin then grudgingly said, “Yeah, we did.”
Travis nudged the diving compressor with his toe. “When was the last time you changed oil in this thing?”
Dennis scratched his beard again.
Emery said, “I just changed it.” He asked Dennis, “When did we do that job for Key West Public Works?”
“Two years ago,” Dennis replied.
Emery’s face slackened. “Two years?” He scratched his head. “Guess I am gettin’ old.”
“No worries, Grandpa,” Travis said. “I’ll get started on it. What does she take?”
Emery held up a finger. “That, I can help with. Come on, whippersnapper.” He led Travis toward the bridge.
“I kept records of all the maintenance we did on the gear,” Dennis said. “And you’re right. We should go through everything to make sure it’s in working order. It’s been awhile since we were an operating salvage unit.”
Ryan stubbed out his cigarette, field stripped the butt, and shoved the trash in his pocket. He glanced up to see a truck drive through the marina gate. It was the same battered pickup from the Hogfish’s parking lot and his apartment complex. He swore.
“What’s the problem?” Dennis asked, gazing in the same direction.
Ryan nodded toward the truck. “Do you recognize the guy in that pickup?”
Dennis said, “Never seen him before. Why?”
They watched the truck kick up dust as it drove east to the end of the quay and made a U-turn. The driver didn’t get out, but Ryan saw the glint of sun off glass as the man put binoculars, or a rifle scope, to his eye.
“Let’s go up to the bridge.” Ryan nudged the captain forward.
“What’s going on?” Dennis asked.
“A good question,” Ryan said. “Right now, we need to get under cover.” If the man was staring at them through a high-powered scope, Ryan wanted to be behind something that could deflect the bullet from the gun the scope was mounted on.
“Under cover?” Dennis said.
“You ever work a salvage case where someone wanted to take away what you were bringing up?”
“A few times,” Dennis replied, stepping into the bridge.
Ryan followed and snatched up the binoculars from the console. He trained them on the truck. Dreadlocks stared back at him through his own binoculars. Ryan felt a sense of relief that it wasn’t a gun scope, and a little let down at the same time. His heart rate slowed, and he took a deep breath to help ward off the adrenaline pounding through his veins.
“Who’s in the truck?” Dennis asked.
“That’s the same truck from your apartment,” Stacey said, moving past Ryan to look out the window. She grabbed the binoculars from his hand and staring through them, said, “Holy cow, that’s the dude I tasered.”
Chapter Nine
Captain Dennis Law leaned forward and took the field glasses from Stacey. “What do you mean tasered?” he asked, fitting them to his eyes.
“That dude was attacking Ryan at his apartment in Key Largo,” Stacey said. “I lit him up with my Taser.”
Dennis set the binoculars down and stepped to the coffee maker. He poured a cup and added a splash of Jim Bean. “This is a story I’d like to hear.”
Ryan explained the situation with the bounty, Jim Kilroy, and the Haitian gold.
Dennis scratched his beard. After a few moments of silence, he said, “That’s a real pickle.”
Stacey had been watching the pickup. “What are we going to do with that guy?”
Ryan glanced out the window and then back at Stacey. “Feel like lighting him up again?”
She grinned and waggled her eyebrows. “You sure know how to talk sweet to me.”
Dennis snorted, and Ryan grinned.
“Better not be anyone sweet talking my girl, eh?” Travis said, stepping onto the bridge. “I need to run into town and get some oil and parts for the compressor.” He moved over to the window. “What are you all staring at, eh?”
“Dreadlocks is back,” Stacey said.
“Who’s Dreadlocks?” Emery asked.
“Just a guy who’s been following me around,” Ryan replied. He lifted a cup of coffee to his lips and took a sip. They really needed to get some new beans. “What are you brewing in this thing?”
“Some blend from Publix,” Dennis said. “I don’t pay attention.”
Ryan said, “It sucks.”
Dennis shook his head. “You’re footing the bill, boss, get us something better. I’m on a fixed income, remember?”
“You can’t taste it through all the Jim Bean,” Emery said.
“Look, old man,” Dennis began.
“Don’t you sass me, whippersnapper.” Emery shook his finger at the captain.
“Don’t ride me, Grandpa.”
“Somebody’s got to,” Emery said quietly.
“When are you going to town?” Ryan asked.
“Now,” Travis said. “I’ve got the oil draining, and it’ll need a couple of changes. There was some water in it.”
“Water?” Dennis asked in surprise.
“Guess Ryan wasn’t being so sarcastic after all,” Travis said.
“Go get the oil.” Ryan pulled a DWR credit card out of his wallet and handed it to Travis. “Get whatever else you need.”
Travis’s face lit up in a broad smile. “That’s an open invitation. Come on, Stacey.”
“We’ve got a little job to do before Stacey leaves,” Ryan said.
Travis cocked his head.
Ryan nodded toward the truck. “I’m going to distract Dreadlocks, and Stacey is going to Taser him again.”
“What for?” Emery asked.
“I want to talk to him, and I want him under control when I do it.”
Stacey grinned and pumped her fists. “Twice in one day.”
Ryan instructed the group on how he wanted things to go down. Then he walked off the pier and headed for the front gate. He stopped to light a cigarette. Travis barreled past him in his big GMC Sierra with Stacey in the passenger seat. Ryan continued inspecting the lobster and fishing boats as he walked along the docks.
At the front gate, Travis stopped, and Stacey hopped out. Ryan knew she would be hidden from Dreadlocks’s view by a screen of trees and brush as she came up on the blind side of the pickup while Ryan kept Dreadlocks distracted.
Ryan smoked two cigarettes by the time he got near the pickup. Dreadlocks had slouched down in the seat and was trying to hide. Ryan walked to the back of the old truck and stopped at the tailgate. It opened
with a squeal of protest. The passenger side support cable had snapped in two, and the tailgate hung lower on that side. Ryan hefted his leg up and set his right butt cheek on the corner of the tailgate and pulled out his cigarettes. He had one in his lips and was bringing the lighter up when Dreadlocks stepped out of the truck.
“What you doin’, mon?”
“Just wanted to have a chat with you?”
“No, mon, ya not sit on another mon’s truck without der permission.”
Ryan let out a long stream of smoke. “I used to think like that. Mine, his, yours. What we have, mon, it belongs to de gods, mon.”
“Dis truck don’t belong to no gods, mon. It belong to me.” He pointed a finger at his chest. Suddenly, his eyes widened and his whole body stiffened. Ryan watched with indifference as electricity coursed through Dreadlocks. He rose to his tiptoes and then fell over on the ground. He curled into a ball as the Taser continued to crackle, releasing voltage into his twitching form.
When the gun finished its thirty-second discharge, Stacey unplugged the cartridge and tossed it onto the ground. The prongs were still lodged in Dreadlocks’s back.
Ryan took another long draw on the cigarette and then stubbed it out on the bed of the truck. He tossed the butt into the pile of trash behind the truck cab and squatted beside the black man on the ground. He pulled the man’s arms out straight and rolled him onto his stomach. He pulled the Taser leads out of his back and tossed them in the truck bed. Next, he fished through the man’s pockets, removing a billfold, a tactical folding knife, and a Hi-Point C9. The 9mm semi-automatic pistol had a reputation for jamming and some said the best way to use the gun was just to throw it at the enemy. He shoved it into his cargo pocket anyway. Better to be safe than leave the gun and have Dreadlocks use it on him later. Inside the billfold, he found a Florida driver’s license for Damian Reid.
Damian moaned and started to roll onto his side. Stacey held the Taser near his head and depressed the trigger. Electricity sizzled between the contacts at the end of the muzzle. “Want me to hit him again?”
“No,” Ryan said. He tossed the wallet in the dirt by the truck’s back wheel. He pushed Damian with his foot. “Sit up.”