Wood’s Tempest
A Mac Travis Adventure
Steven Becker
The White Marlin Press
Copyright © 2018 by Steven Becker
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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One
Mac watched the weather-brick swing, then stop, and spin slightly. The primitive forecasting tool was more of a novelty than a predictor, and it proved inconclusive at best. October in the Keys could bring anything from a hurricane to a cold front, and the brick suspended from a piece of string reflected that mood. It was also an indicator of his own mood. His life had been in a nice groove, then came the call last week from Kurt Hunter, a special agent for the National Park Service stationed in Biscayne National Park. Since then, Mac’s past, or at least the part of it that he’d rather forget, had come back to haunt him. With his mind spinning like the weather-brick, he finished the Yuengling and looked down the bar at Rusty, signaling for another by tapping the empty bottle on the bar.
Two beers was his self-imposed limit, enough to unwind after the day’s events and the ride back from Miami, but facing a nighttime run to reach his island retreat, he needed to be careful. Rusty came by with a fresh beer and set it on the bar. Mac looked through the clear lid of the dry box containing a hard drive, with years worth of Gill Gross’s research, sitting in front of him and wondered if it wouldn’t be better to toss it. He knew what it contained and the trouble it could bring, but like a fresh ballyhoo to a mahi, he also knew he couldn’t resist.
“You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Rusty said, taking the empty and tossing it into a recycling bin, something his daughter Julie had pressed on him.
Mac looked around the Rusty Anchor and, after a glance at the door to make sure that his past hadn’t followed him here from Miami, said, “You know about Gill Gross getting killed?”
“Sure. Did some diving with him back in the day. You’re not mixed up in that, are you? Been keeping an eye on the news.”
“More than I want to be.” Subconsciously, Mac pulled the dry box toward him, catching Rusty’s eye. There were no questions. The two men had known each other for years and didn’t have to speak to communicate. Mac tipped the bottle back and finished the beer. He pulled out a soggy twenty and laid it on the bar with a set of keys. “Thank Jesse for the loaner when you see him.”
“Will do,” Rusty said, picking up the empty bottle and bill. He went to the register, rang up the beers, and brought back change.
Mac pushed the bills toward him. “Better get home before Mel has my head.”
“Probably thinks you’re out with Trufante. Ain’t seen him around in a while.”
Mac’s personal shit magnet rarely frequented the Rusty Anchor, preferring to hang out where there was less supervision—or at least without Rusty watching him. “His girlfriend split for Key West. He’s been down and out lately.”
“That’s not a good place for him. She was different, but seemed to ground him. Boy needs someone like that.”
Mac nodded. Trufante had a way of finding trouble, or trouble finding him. Either way, Pamela had been a good influence on the deckhand. “I’ll be sure to say hello when I see him. Probably go check the traps tomorrow.” Mac glanced back at the weather-brick still spinning on the rope.
Rusty must have seen it too. The brick foretold the obvious: not moving equaled no wind, moving was a breeze, hard to see was foggy, wet was raining. There were all kinds of variations, but the locals were superstitious, and Mac and Rusty looked up at the twin TVs at the same time. One showed a ball game and the other was an internet feed of the local radar and weather conditions. Living on the island chain, the weather was the number one topic of conversation and dictated what most people did with their days. The local image was clear, but that wasn’t what they were concerned about. The next image showed the Atlantic Ocean. What had started as an area of disturbed air off the coast of Africa last week now had a name and was spinning off the coast of the Dominican Republic. Mac had been looking at weather patterns for years and had been keeping an eye on this one since it had formed.
“No other weather comes to play, that thing’ll be here inside a few days,” Rusty said. “Gonna start buttoning up things around here in the morning.”
Mac didn’t respond. The worst fear of a man living on an island was less than a thousand miles away. “See ya around,” he said, picking up the dry box from the bar and sliding the keys to The Beast toward Rusty. He had borrowed the rebuilt 1973 International Travelall belonging to Jesse McDermitt, who lived on a nearby island in the Content Keys. He was the closest neighbor Mac had, and along with Rusty, was one of the only men Mac trusted.
On his way out the door, Mac looked at the box again and wondered if Kurt Hunter fell into that category. His new wife, Justine, who worked as a forensics tech for Miami-Dade, had handed the box to him without explanation earlier today. Tucking it under his arm, Mac walked past the shack housing the Caribbean’s finest full-time cook and part-time philosopher, Rufus. Mac almost stopped for one of his famous hogfish sandwiches, but with darkness unfolding, he decided he should get moving.
Hoping that Mel had cooked dinner was a crapshoot. Although she was a good cook, since Mac had installed satellite internet on the island last year for her, she often shifted into lawyer mode and forgot time. The past summer’s red tide just north of their island had been one of the worst in decades, and her involvement as an advocate in the fight against Big Sugar polluting the coastal waters consumed her. He couldn’t argue, after seeing the results firsthand when a king tide had brought the fish kills to his doorstep.
Thankfully, once he passed Rufus’s shack, the wind took the smell in the other direction, and he continued down the path to the dock. The Rusty Anchor had a small turning basin with a deepwater channel leading to the Atlantic. It wasn’t a marina, but did house several live-aboards. Mac waved to a couple on a trawler as he untied his center console and dropped to the deck.
After placing the box in the compartment below the wheel, he started the center console’s single 250-horsepower engine and pushed off the dock. After spinning around, he idled out of the canal, smiling for the first time all day. Leavi
ng land behind often did that. No matter how the world chose to conspire against him, the freedom of a boat rarely failed to put a smile on his face. Just before he pressed the throttle down, he heard his phone ring.
He could remember a time, not long ago, when he rarely turned his out-of-date phone on. Now he regretted he was attached to his like everyone else. Originally, he had justified it for the weather and navigation apps, not wanting to admit he would be lost without it. The ring startled him. Still jumpy from the confrontation with two of his old nemeses—Slipstream, an old-timer from Wood’s day, and the state archeologist Jim DeWitt, who were both now in custody for the murders of Gill Gross and one of his backers—he pulled the phone from his pocket and, acting out of character, answered it without looking at the caller ID.
“We goin’ tomorrow?” Trufante asked.
Mac thought for a second. “Weather’s getting close. I’d like to get another day or two’s soak out of them, but I’m thinking now we should just pull them.”
“You the man,” Trufante said. “What time you want me?”
“Be out at my place at seven.” There was a moment’s pause on the line. Mac could hear the background sounds of a bar while he waited for Trufante to answer. The longer the pause meant the longer he’d been there.
“Got a small transportation problem.”
Mac thought about the swirling circle out in the Atlantic. Sometimes storms lingered; others blasted through the open water, growing in size and intensity as they sucked the warm moisture from the ocean. In the case of the latter, the far-reaching effects could start to impact them as early as tomorrow night. At this point he was certain it was going to affect the islands in some way. Odds were it wasn’t going to be a direct hit, but it didn’t have to be to cause damage. Leaving his stone crab and lobster pots out would mean losing them.
“I’ll come get you. Keep quiet and out of sight and you can stay on the big boat overnight,” Mac said, referring to his trawler that was out at the island. Having Trufante that close to Mel could mean trouble, and Mac hoped the mangroves between the lone pile where it was tied and the house would be enough of a barrier between them. “Where you at?”
“Pickled Pelican.”
It took Mac a long second to place the bar. The Keys might be paradise for tourists, but it was a harsh climate for businesses. They changed hands regularly, and keeping track of them was not on his radar. “I’m running out of the Anchor now. I’ll pick you up in twenty minutes.” He paused. “And don’t make me come upstairs after you.” He disconnected and pushed the throttle down. The boat leveled out, and without the weight of a T-top, which had been damaged during another Trufante episode, the hull was soon skipping over the small wind waves.
With the breeze blowing through what was left of his hair and the occasional mist of salty spray landing on his face, Mac found himself smiling despite his concerns. On the Atlantic side, he passed the mouth of Sister Creek, skirted West Sister Rock, and, staying to the ten-foot contour, rounded Knights Key. With the Seven Mile Bridge ahead, he set course for the fourth opening from the eastern end and cruised past the entrance to Boot Key Harbor before crossing under the new span of the bridge and entering the gulf. Once past the old bridge, he turned gradually to the east and followed Vaca Key toward the small breakwater that led to Keys Fisheries, where his smile faded.
Passing the turn to the right that led to a charter-boat marina, Mac headed straight until he found an opening between two lobster boats tied up against the concrete seawall. With little current inside the protected water, he idled in place, waiting for Trufante. The short tropical twilight was about to fade to night, and the security lights hadn’t come on yet, but even in the low light, there was no sign of Trufante’s six-five frame or his smile that resembled the grille of a Cadillac. Cursing under his breath, Mac pulled up to the dock and reached for one of the old, frayed lines he used to secure the boat.
With his head down, he crossed in front of Key’s Fisheries and looked up at the large, palm-frond-covered bar set up on pilings. Glancing out at the boats in the marina, he was surprised to see the bar wasn’t the only business that had changed hands here. It had only been a few weeks—maybe a month—since this had been Celia’s domain. The flamboyant woman had helped Mac in the past, though the last time he had seen her it was to tell her the quad-powered boat he had borrowed was a total loss. The marina was dark and quiet, a stark contrast to when she used to run it. Then, it had been home to a fleet of blinged-out, quad-powered sportfishers that lit the night with their multi-colored LED lights. The story would come out eventually, but for now, he needed to haul the Cajun out of the bar.
After climbing the last step, Mac looked cautiously at the crowded bar overlooking the water. There were a few deckhands he recognized, but none of the captains who would want to bend his ear about the bite. Mac was one of them, but at the same time kept his distance. His traps were always the farthest out, and the other captains, when they could pry any intel out of him, used his success or failure as a bellwether for where to set their traps. Mac was tight-lipped. His mate was not.
Trufante sat at the bar surrounded by a half-dozen people. They were staring at the TV, which showed the same image that Mac had seen at the Rusty Anchor. Trufante, as the local expert on everything, was regaling the crowd with old hurricane stories in exchange for drinks.
The crowd parted as Mac walked directly toward Trufante, whose Cadillac grin faded briefly when he saw him. After a quick calculation of how to maximize his benefactor’s appearance, he turned to Mac. Knowing what he was dealing with, Mac grabbed Trufante by the arm and, without a word, pulled him away from the bar. With Mac gripping his right arm, Trufante reached back with his left and, at the maximum reach of his wide wingspan, was able to snag his drink off the bar. With a few goodbyes, said backward as Mac pulled Trufante out of the exit, the duo headed downstairs to the parking lot.
“Them boys would have bought you drinks all night if you’d just be nicer,” Trufante said as they passed several stacks of lobster traps.
“Being nice never got me anywhere,” Mac muttered as he led the Cajun to his boat.
Two
From almost a quarter mile out, Mac could see Mel, with her hands on her hips, standing on the beach. Between the low light and the distance, he couldn’t read the expression on her face, but he knew what it was. There was no hiding Trufante on the twenty-four-foot boat.
With his mind trying to fabricate a story, even though he knew she wouldn’t buy it, Mac slowed the boat and turned around a small whirlpool that disguised a coral head. The backcountry of the Keys was better marked than it used to be, but many small channels and hazards were navigated at the mariner’s own risk. Without the standard green-square and red-triangular placards, the homemade markers were as dangerous as what they hid, offering no clues as to what they represented. Local markers, often only hand-driven stakes or pipes, some with jugs or buoys attached, others unmarked, were placed by residents. There was one that had a toilet seat hanging from it. The lone pile that Wood had sunk years ago inside a small deepwater channel that he had dredged leading to the island was a good example. Heading directly toward it would be a mistake. What it didn’t tell you was that there was a large rock, submerged except at the lowest of low tides, that had to be skirted to reach the safety of the channel.
Privacy had been Wood’s goal when he built the original structures on the island in the early nineties. The solitary pile was his concession to tie off a larger boat. Up the narrow beach, and behind a gate camouflaged by mangroves, lay a small clearing with a winch and an old truck axle that he had used to haul out his old skiff. The original house had been carefully sited so it would be invisible to the casual passerby. Unless you knew the island was inhabited, it looked like every other mangrove-covered key. Mac had left the old gate system in place, but since moving here full -time with Mel, his forty-two-foot trawler signaled his presence.
Once past the rock, he coasted up
against his trawler. With its bow secured to the pile and a stern anchor deployed, Mac used the trawler to secure the center console. With the boat secure, he climbed over the gunwale and stepped into the thigh-deep water.
“Why?” Mel asked.
Mac could see her face and knew he was in trouble. “Got a storm out there. Figured it’d be best to pull the traps in the morning.”
Mel had grown up here and knew the weather and water as well as Mac. She relaxed slightly. “He’s staying on the trawler,” she said, and walked away.
Mac waited until she was far enough along the winding trail before turning to Trufante. “Think you can stay out of trouble for one night?”
“Dude, I’m already down and out.” Lifting one long leg, Trufante stepped onto the gunwale and across to the trawler.
“All right, then. We’ll get an early start.” Mac left him and waded toward the beach. Before he reached dry land, he remembered the dry box and went back for it.
“What’cha got there?” Trufante asked, popping a beer he had taken from the galley refrigerator.
Along with his nine lives, most of which he had already spent, Trufante had the instincts and eyesight of a cat. “Nothing.” Mac subconsciously moved the box to his other hand and out of sight from the Cajun. He tucked the box into the crook of his arm like a football and started down the path. Mac noted the recent growth. It was a war to keep the brush at bay, and the three-foot-wide walkway had well-defined walls where the machete had done its work. Mac looked down as he walked, struggling to see the roots in the dim light. After a few hundred feet, he reached a large clearing that contained the house and a small storage shed.
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