by Dale Mayer
Lionel started to cry.
She reached out and held him tight. “So you killed them all?” she asked Daniel. “Even Bruce? Was he involved?”
“No, he wasn’t, but he saw me kill the doc. I had no choice then. I was already too committed. I’m sorry about killing Bruce. … At one time I wondered if I could get off here alive and have them all be fish food. However, with the new arrivals, it was great in one way but not in others. … Besides, my job isn’t quite done,” he said. “I’ve got a beef with one still,” he said. “I just had to wait for him to arrive.” He turned and glared at Gregor, who immediately started screaming.
“You’re fucking nuts,” Gregor said. “I didn’t have anything to do with it. I don’t even know what you’re talking about!”
Then the rest of it clicked into place for her—why the schedule had seemed so familiar.
“That’s why they were planning the dates,” she said. “I saw the schedule. It was the same dates you were flying in.”
“This was not a scheduled flight,” he said. “What kind of an idiot are you, anyway?”
“No. It was scheduled, but you canceled it, and then, when the blast blew, you came anyway,” she said. “But you were also scheduled to come in for my rape,” she said. “The same as you were here every time they drugged Lionel and before that, with my friend Tabitha.”
He straightened and glared at her. “You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about! Do you really think I would have brought these guys in with me if that were the case?”
“Of course,” she said. “It was a perfect cover, wasn’t it?”
“Well, it was,” Daniel said. “Except for one thing that I know. I’ve got the pictures of you doing my brother.”
Gregor’s face twisted with disgust. “I’m not a fucking gay homosexual,” he said.
“No, and that’s why you did it. To put him in his place as, what did you say? The scum and an abhorrence to this world.”
Gregor straightened and said, “You can’t prove a thing,” he said. “You’re full of shit.”
“Actually I can,” he said. “I’ve already given Axel the proof. And what I don’t have, I’m pretty sure Troy and Berkley have already got.” He glanced at the two of them, and they both nodded.
“Yes,” Berkley said. “I can coordinate his schedule with all the rapes. He was part of it right from the beginning.”
“That’s what I thought,” Daniel said. He walked closer to his brother and gave him a big hug.
Troy was hanging on to Gregor, who even now was trying to get back up into the helicopter.
She looked over at Troy and Axel and said, “There’s no room for all of us.”
“I know,” Troy said. “And we don’t have much time now.”
“Shit,” she said. “I don’t have to go into the water, do I?”
“No,” he said, with a gentle smile. “At least I don’t think so.” He said to Lionel, “Come on. Let’s get you up into the helicopter.”
Lionel shook his head. “Not without my brother.”
“No, I’m not going, dude.” He looked over at Lionel, smiled, and said, “Remember, I love you, brother.” He then made a flying tackle at Gregor, the company man. Picking him up over his shoulder, he made a crazy-ass jump and dove off the edge of the rig.
She screamed, and Lionel screamed, and everybody raced to the edge, where they could see that both men had hit and were speared onto an open piece of metal, swinging free from the blast. Lionel’s screams turned into wailing cries.
Berkley grabbed him and held on tight. “I’m so sorry, Lionel, but he’d killed a lot of people over this, and his life would have been a nightmare in prison. I am so sorry for your loss, but you have to go now.” With one last hug, she pushed him toward Troy, who picked him up, loaded him into the helicopter, and buckled him into the last spot. “Get going,” he shouted at the pilot.
The pilot looked at him in shock and looked down at the company man. “What about you guys?”
“We’re covered,” he said, jumping off the runner of the chopper and signaling the pilot to go.
In moments the rotors were turning faster, and the pilot lifted the helicopter straight up, then took off, heading toward land.
Then Berkley noted another helicopter coming toward them from a navy ship in the near distance. “How will we get us all on that?” she cried out.
“Well, our other two guys took Nelson and Mason with them, already in the big lifeboat, and they’ll deliver Idiot and Jonesy to the authorities for us,” he said, “so it’s just the three of us left.”
When she saw a long strap dangling from the helicopter, hanging down with hooks, she groaned and said, “Seriously?”
“Do you trust me?” Troy asked with a big smile.
She threw her arms around him. “Absolutely.”
Axel quickly buckled them up and tugged the rope, so they would start to winch them up.
She looked down at him and panicked. “You have to come,” she said. “Jump on right now. The helicopter can carry us, but this rig is going at any moment.”
Just then another blast came and a massive creaking sound followed. Axel made one jump and grabbed the winch and the hook that was on the bottom. Troy reached down and grabbed his hand, and together they were swept upward as the winch in the helicopter pulled them higher and higher. Axel was the first one helped in, as the most precariously positioned of the three, and then they were looped over, and both Troy and Berkley landed inside the helicopter. She stared in shock as the blasts continued on the rig, with fires now shooting up from multiple areas, as it self-destructed. Of Daniel and Gregor, the company man, there was absolutely no sign. That part of the rig had fallen under the heavy waves, never to be seen again.
*
Troy quickly buckled her in, not sure how much of the look on her face was just her body going into shock to protect her from what had happened or simply a total overload of her brain. He sat down beside her, as they were quickly swept back over to the naval ship. “Are you okay?”
She looked at him, still in shock, and then slowly nodded. “I think so,” she said. “It was Daniel all the time.”
“And it makes sense, right?” Axel said. “There’s no love like family.”
She nodded. “And poor Lionel, I still can’t believe what they did to him.”
“And the women,” Troy reminded her.
She nodded. “At least now we have an idea of who and what happened, so maybe we can get some closure for the victims.”
“The company will have a hell of a time bailing themselves out of this one,” he said.
“Not necessarily,” she said, “but, if you guys give us a hand, then maybe we can get them. There won’t be any criminal charges because it seems all the main players are dead,” she said in a broken tone. “But Idiot and Jonesy? Surely they can land some hefty jail time. And maybe the victims can get a settlement so they can get help to move forward.”
“Exactly,” he said. “Stay positive. These things take a lot of time, but this will work out.”
She reached over and slipped her hand in his. “Thank you.”
He grinned. “Hey, remember that date part?”
“Yeah, didn’t we say Italian?”
“Nope,” he said. “We said Japanese.”
“We said Italian,” she said, staring out at the water. “I distinctly remember Italian.”
“You know something? I’m pretty sure it was Japanese,” he said, “but that just means we’ll have to go out twice.”
She smiled, looked up at him, and said, “I think I can manage that.”
As soon as they disembarked, he helped her to a room on the destroyer, where they were quickly debriefed and then given a bunk room for their own use.
As she walked into the small room, she shook her head. “So how long will we be here?”
“Just a couple days,” he said. “Once we get a little closer to land, we’ll fly you back in again and
head home, down to the base.”
“I’m from San Diego,” she said. “You’re from Coronado.”
“Same diff,” he said. He dropped his bag on the floor.
“How come you have gear?” she asked suspiciously. “And I lost everything?”
“Not quite everything,” he said. “I did scoop up your laptop and a few things. It’s in my bag,” he said. “Mine is full of the extra weapons we brought. We didn’t want them to go under if they didn’t have to.”
“I didn’t get a shower. Do you mind?”
“Not at all,” he said, then he explained the navy’s shower system to her, so they could make the most efficient use of the water on board.
She came out soon afterward, wearing a robe. “It’s strange. I know I’m physically clean,” she said, “but, on the inside, I feel dirty.”
“Come on. Let’s lie down and relax,” he said. “You’ve got a couple hours to yourself,” he said. “Then we’ll have to go talk to various people, particularly once we tap into land—the bosses and the military police.”
“Right,” she said, “not to mention the local police and the company reps.”
“Exactly,” he said.
She laid down on the bed with a blanket over her and said, “You know something?”
“What?”
“I think I’d feel much cleaner if you were with me.”
He looked at her for a moment, puzzled. “How does that have anything to do with being clean?”
“Forget clean. Let’s say, renewed. Maybe refreshed. How about restoring my faith?”
“Now that,” he said, “I can get behind.” He walked to the door, made sure it was locked, and then stripped down in front of her.
“I’m barely dressed as it is,” she said, throwing back the blanket. “I only came out in a robe and my underwear.”
“Still way too many clothes,” he said, and, completely nude, he climbed in beside her.
She sat up, quickly divested herself of the robe and her bra and panties, and looked at him. “I didn’t really expect this to happen when I put out that SOS.”
“But you did ask for help, and you never know what you’ll get back.” He laughed. “Besides, I don’t think there’s anything I like better than helping damsels in distress.”
She reached up and placed a finger on his lips. “As long as this isn’t the typical result from all that rescuing.”
He chuckled and pulled her down. “No way. This is a first.”
“And the last,” she whispered as their lips met.
He kissed her, first gently, then hard, deep, and passionately, as she twisted beneath him with joy in her heart.
She realized that it was finally over. They were safe, and everything in her world would be okay again. She would have to mourn the loss of innocence in Tabitha and Lionel, plus the loss of Daniel in her own way. And she would have to help deal with the aftermath for Tabitha and Lionel. That would not be easy. The inquiry and investigation into this nightmare would go on for weeks, months, or perhaps much longer, but she hoped the entire industry would take steps to ensure that such a terrible thing would never happen again and that no one would have to work in such an atmosphere of abuse on the rigs—or elsewhere—ever again.
She was also thankful to not have to go back to that same rig. She knew it was billions of dollars’ worth of rig now buried in the sea and that the environmental hazard was also something that would take a long time to mop up, but she couldn’t be at all upset that it was destroyed. It represented such evil.
“Stop thinking,” he whispered. He kissed her, his tongue sliding along the edge of her lips before delving deep inside.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and held him close. He slid his hands in hers and pulled her arms up over her head, and she moaned as their bodies linked and twisted together. “You feel so damn good,” she said.
“There’s just something about danger, something about coming close to losing your life.”
“I think it’s more than that,” she said. “It was seeing the depravity of humanity and realizing that, once again, Mother Nature wins. She’ll completely absorb all that nastiness, feed it to the fish, and try to move on. I can only hope that I can too.”
He kissed her again and again. “You will,” he said. “We’ll make sure of it.”
She smiled. “You’re the best thing that came out of that place, you know?”
“No,” he whispered, trailing kisses across her cheek, breathing heavily against her ear and her neck. “I’d have to say, you are.”
She could feel shudders rocking her body. “Oh, my God, that feels so good,” she whispered, twisting beneath him.
He held her hands tight and firm.
She groaned as she tried to touch him but couldn’t move. He slid down her body, his kisses leaving a hot moist trail everywhere they went. He latched onto one nipple and suckled deep, and she could feel a response pooling in her abdomen. She groaned, raising her hips, her pelvis pressing against him, as he slid from left to right, giving the other breast the same treatment. Finally he slowly slid his hands down her arms, all the way down her hips to reach underneath and to cup her buttocks and squeezed them gently, all the while his mouth explored her ribs, her belly, and down to the moistness at the heart of her. When he reached for a taste, she shuddered and cried out.
He placed a hand gently over her mouth, and she realized that she could be heard. It was all she could do to keep back the cries as he tasted and delved and teased, until she was a liquid pool of mind-numbing jelly. When he finally rose up, she grabbed him by the hair and tugged him all the way up and then down to her lips. She kissed him deeply, and he finally slid all the way inside her body.
“Now that feels like a welcome home,” she whispered, smiling.
He lifted his head and smiled back at her and said, “I think that’s the nicest thing I’ve heard yet.”
“I mean it,” she said. “It’s been a long time of traveling and feeling like I was missing something in my life.”
“Well, hopefully we can find it together,” he said, “because I’m sure as hell not letting you go back to an oil rig like that one again.”
She smiled and wrapped her legs around him. “Agreed. How about we find a place and sort ourselves out for a bit and figure out our future together?”
He started to move, building up the pace faster and faster, diving deeper and harder into the heart of her. It was all she could do to hang on and to not let her cries rip out through the destroyer they were on. When she finally crashed over the edge of the cliff, he cried out gently above her and then slowly sagged down.
Wrapping her up in his arms, he whispered, “How about we figure out our future together every day, knowing that we have all the tomorrows ahead of us?”
With tears in her eyes, she whispered, “That sounds beautiful to me.”
“So sleep now,” he whispered. “And, when you wake up, it’ll be a whole new day.”
She did exactly that. She slept deeply and beautifully peaceful, feeling safe with him at her side.
Epilogue
Axel Salisbury almost leaped out of the office building; he was so happy the day was over. He’d been training on a software inventory management system. Office work. Ugh. As far as he was concerned, it was a load of crap. But their skill sets had to be updated on a regular basis. He’d much rather go out for target practice or for a workout in the gym or even for basic maintenance on their gear, but it wasn’t to be. Today was all about paper-pushing. He shuddered at that. As he threw his bag into the back of the Jeep, a shout came across the parking lot. He turned to see Mason. He walked across, shook his hand, and said, “You look like you recovered from that lovely trip we just completed.”
Mason nodded, his face grim. “That was a mess, wasn’t it?”
“The place wasn’t so bad,” Axel said, “but the people? Wow.”
“The company’s going through quite the headaches right now, between the
government court cases and overhauling their employment practices, not to mention dealing with the fallout from the sabotage and the lawsuits from the sexual assault victims.”
“Sounds like they needed to have done something about it a long time ago,” Axel said, shaking his head. “And, so far, it’s been quiet since we got home.”
“Not anymore,” Mason said. “I need you on a team with me right now.”
Axel looked at him in surprise. “Now?”
“Somebody’ll be in front of your place in thirty minutes,” he said. “We’ve got a submarine down with eleven men and one woman on board.”
“One of ours?” Odd that it would have so few crew.
“It’s a new generation sub, smaller, more agile. Crew went down, doing some testing on it. And they’re stuck. We’re flying out in ninety minutes.”
At that, Axel nodded and said, “I’ll go home and grab my to-go bag.” He walked back to his Jeep, hopped in, and drove toward his apartment. He parked, grabbed his laptop bag, went in, his mind already sorting through what he might need to add to his already prepped to-go duffel. He prided himself on being ready in minutes. Lives often depended on it.
He was outside and waiting as a truck came by and picked him up. Mason wasn’t among the crew. Axel nodded and took the last empty place in the vehicle. “Do we have an update on the crew?”
“Last communication said they were alive, but that was over an hour ago,” the driver said, “but they’ve been beached on the sea floor.”
“Anybody know why?”
“An on-board explosion.” came the driver’s terse answer.
He nodded and thought about that. “So oxygen’s the issue.”
Axel studied the three guys with him. He knew Dane and Cooper from Mason’s crew. But the guy beside him, he didn’t know. He reached out a hand and said, “I’m Axel.”
“Bale Henderson.”
Axel nodded and didn’t say anything. He’d heard a lot of names before, but that was a first for that one.