Pursuing Chase

by C J Schnier

  The water was murky, nothing at all like what we had seen in the Bahamas or the Keys. Visibility was still decent despite the cloudy water, and I could pick out the bottom in five feet or less.

  “Here, swap places with me and steer,” I told Kelly once we started to get near Fowler’s property. Once she had taken over driving, I grabbed the fishing rod and tied an artificial shrimp lure to the end of the line. Maybe I could catch dinner too.

  Kelly piloted us up the line of boats and docks. I cast my lure over and over again without even getting a nibble until we were only a few dozen yards off of Fowler’s dock. Something took my bait and started to run with it. Snatching up on the rod I could feel the hook set.

  “Fish on!” I cried as I started to reel.

  The fish fought hard despite my oversized tackle. It turned and made a run for the dock and the shelter of its pilings. The fish was strong enough to drag the dinghy through the water and make my reel buzz as it stripped line from it. I tightened the drag and made sure to keep my rod tip up to make it harder for the fleeing fish. Eventually, it tired enough that I managed to reel it in. Once alongside I grabbed the fish by the mouth and hoisted a beautiful silver fish with a black stripe down its side. It was a perfect, legal sized snook.

  “You know those are out of season right?” Kelly asked.

  I looked around, considered throwing it back, and then decided better of it. “I won’t tell if you don’t. Let’s just make sure we follow all the rules on the way back.”

  “Looks like we have dinner,” Kelly said glancing over her own shoulder.

  “Heck yeah. Snook is my favorite. We’ll be eating good.”

  I held the fish up after I had removed the hook and then tossed it into the cooler. When I looked up again, I noticed that we had been pulled in close to Fowler’s dock. The backyard was open to the water, and the boat was in plain view. We would have to be very stealthy when we made our move.

  “Why do you think he has some of his hurricane shutters up already?” Kelly asked me, pointing towards the house.

  Most of the second and third story windows had heavy steel shutters rolled down over them, but the majority of the downstairs windows were open to the water.

  “He must have them closed so that spotlights from boaters don’t bother him at night. Kind of a shame, he pays all this money to live on the water and can’t even enjoy it,” I said.

  “Well that may work out for us,” Kelly noted. “They won’t be able to see anything if they wake up during the heist. They’ll have to come all the way downstairs to see us when we nab this big boy.”

  “You’re right, and did you notice something else strange about the boat itself?” I asked.

  A brief second passed, and then her face lit up with realization, “It’s backward! Every other boat backed into their dock, but this one didn’t.”

  “Right you are. But what I can’t figure out is why. I’m not complaining, it’ll help mask the noise of the exhaust, but why would they not back it in?”

  “I think I know why,” Kelly said with certainty. “It’s too shallow, they don’t want to risk damaging the rudders or propellers.”

  She was right. A dozen feet in front of the bow of Aquaholic a blue heron stalked prey in only a few inches of water. Any farther forward and the boat would be aground. Any farther back and it wouldn’t fit on the dock. Aquaholic only drew five feet, but Lake Boca Raton wasn’t much deeper than that. We would have to be careful when we backed her off the dock.

  “Let’s check out the stern, with it facing this way we should be able to get aboard without being seen,” I suggested.

  “Hey Chase, do you think you can handle something this big?” Kelly asked as she started to maneuver the dinghy.

  “You should know,” I quipped with a wink and a smirk. “I can handle just about anything that floats, size isn’t a big deal I’ve found.”

  Shrugging, Kelly drove the dinghy down the side of Aquaholic and swung around to the stern, making sure to stay far enough away that if anybody were watching they wouldn’t think we were trying to board. There was a teak dinghy platform jutting out from the stern that was often used for a small tender or even a pair of jet skis. The cradles to hold the boats were in place, but the deck was empty.

  “Looks like getting aboard won’t be hard. How do you plan to start the boat though?”

  “I haven’t figured that out yet. If we can get inside, I bet there is a key in the ignition or at least at the helm. This is a pretty secure home, I doubt he would expect anyone to try to steal a boat off his dock while he is home, especially one this big. My guess is that he locks the sliding glass door with one key and leaves the ignition key on the boat.” I said, working through the problem out loud.

  “Alright, then how do we get inside?” Kelly asked.

  “I’m still working on that one. Come on, let’s get out of here before someone gets suspicious. I want to check that inlet out anyways.”

  We pulled away from Fowler’s property and made our way south and under the drawbridge that guarded the mouth of the inlet. The inlet was small and shallow. Two small jetties protected the mouth of it, but with any east wind it would be hard to get through safely. I had Kelly make several passes, and we discovered that the north end had shoaled up compared to the south end.

  I used the fishing pole as a sort of manual depth sounder to find the deepest parts as she made her passes. If we hugged the south end of the inlet, we could make it. There were only some small private markers in the pass, and they did not mark the deeper parts. Some of them were entirely above the water on dry land. We would have to be very careful if we used this route.

  Boca Raton Pass was my first choice of an escape route. It emptied into the Atlantic Ocean. Valentine’s “boat shed” as he called it, was much farther down south, somewhere up the Miami River. If we had to take the ICW, progress would be painfully slow as we waited for at least four bridges to open for us. Just to get out of Lake Boca Raton another way, we would have to wait on at least one bridge, no matter which route we took. That was a lot of downtime. If the theft were noticed, the cops would be on us instantly.

  “I think we can make it this way,” Kelly said after I had checked the depths for a second time.

  “Yeah, I think so too. We should get a handheld GPS and make a track through here to deep water. We can just follow it with Aquaholic when the time comes,” I suggested.

  “That’s a good idea,” she agreed, “but I think it is time to get home, the sun will be setting soon, and I’m craving some of that snook you caught.”

  “Well, what are you waiting for? Get on it!” I said.

  Kelly whipped the wheel around and hammered down on the throttle, nearly slinging me from the boat. She zigged and zagged through all the boat traffic and bridges, never once letting up. I once again had to marvel at her, damn that woman was good with a boat.

  Chapter Twenty Seven

  “You all set Andy?” I called down Romulus’s companionway.

  “Just about,” he replied, popping his head out of the hatch into the orange light of a Florida sunrise. “What about you? Tonight is the night right?”

  “Yeah, I think we’re just about ready to do this. I never thought I’d be a boat thief, but then again, I never thought I’d be a drug smuggler either,” I said.

  “Well you should go over the plan with me once again then,” he said.

  “Around midnight Kelly will drop me in the middle of Lake Boca Raton. I’m going to do my best to impersonate a Navy SEAL and swim to the stern of Aquaholic, board her, and break into her. Once I get her fired up, I’ll untie her and bring her down to Valentine’s place as fast as possible,” I explained.

  “So you’re not taking the ICW?”

  “Nope, it’ll be faster to take the outside route. Kelly and I have mapped out the inlet, and if we time it right, we should be fine. High tide is at 00:20 so it should work out perfect.”

  “Is midnight going to be late en
ough?”

  “I think so,” I said, doubting this part of the plan myself. “Fowler is normally in bed by then, and he can’t see anything out of those hurricane shutters. As long as I can get off the dock without his noticing, I should be fine.”

  “And what about Kelly?” he asked.

  “What’s with the twenty questions? Are you testing my plan for holes?” I asked.

  “Something like that. I’d hate to see you come this far and fail.”

  “She’s taking the dinghy back here and then driving the BMW to Valentine’s boat shed to pick me up. Valentine is supposed to have someone there with the money, so once we’re paid, we can get this debt off our backs.”

  “That’s a pretty simple plan, Chase. Do you think it will work?”

  “You know the age-old saying of sailors, K.I.S.S. Keep It Simple Stupid. It has worked for me so far. Now, what about you? You’re headed out today before all the fun?”

  “Yeah, I want to get back around to Crystal River and my hurricane hole. There is already another storm beating up the islands, Irma I think this one is called. It looks like a nasty one, and I have a bad feeling about it. I wouldn’t stick around South Florida Chase. Get your money and get somewhere safer.”

  “We will. I have no intention of hanging around here any longer than I have to.”

  “Good. I’m leaving after noon. I’ll keep my VHF on. I’m sure once the report goes out about a missing superyacht it’ll be all over the airwaves.”

  ***

  My heart was racing as Kelly piloted the dinghy across Lake Boca Raton towards our target. Two hundred yards from Fowler’s dock she put the boat in neutral and let it coast through the darkness. There was no boat traffic and the sweltering summer night had long since stifled the last remnants of the evening sea breeze, leaving the lake dark and calm.

  As she crept toward our destination, I buckled my pair of dive fins to my feet and pulled a neoprene dive hood over my head. Rifling through a small dry bag by feel, I checked for the fifth time that it still contained what little equipment I was bringing. Convinced everything was there, I squeezed all the excess air out of the bag and rolled the top shut, creating a waterproof seal. Then, I zipped up my plain black wetsuit and finally slipped on a pair of tight-fitting dive gloves.

  Kelly’s gaze was fixed on me with an iron resolve. She nodded, giving me a slight boost of confidence. I reached forward and pulled her close, kissing her passionately. If this whole operation went wrong, or I managed to mess it up, this could be my last kiss as a free man. Breaking off our embrace, she whispered a husky, “Good luck.” I nodded to her and swung my legs over the side of the boat and slid into the warm inky waters.

  Kelly let the inflatable float several feet away before she put the outboard back in forward and took off back home. I tread water as I watched her disappear into the darkness until all I could see was the white navigation light on the back of the inflatable boat making its way down the ICW. Summoning all of my resolve I turned towards Fowler’s property, and the colossal yacht docked just before it. It was time to add grand theft in the first degree to my growing list of felonies.

  I swam slowly but steadily towards the stern of Aquaholic, making sure to stay as low in the water as possible. I used a side stroke to cover the distance, both because it was my most efficient swim stroke and because it left very little disturbance in the water. When Fowler and the police checked the surveillance footage, I wanted to make it as hard as possible for them to ascertain anything of value.

  When I was two hundred feet from the superyacht, I dove several feet underneath the surface and started kicking. Under the water there was no light, it felt as though I was swimming through space with nothing to guide me. Cursing myself for not bringing an underwater compass, I forced myself to continue swimming forward until I could make out the dock lights through the murky water. Correcting my course to the left, I managed to surface just five feet behind Aquaholic.

  Glancing around as I caught my breath, I checked for the presence of anyone on the dock or boat. Both were quiet, precisely as they had been the previous nights. So far so good.

  Hoisting myself onto the swim platform, however, proved to be more difficult than I had expected. The platform was two feet above the surface of the water, and with rounded edges, there was nothing to grab. My gloves, unable to grip the slick surfaces only made my fumbling worse. I removed my fins and the dry bag and placed them on the edge. With a hard kick, I managed to get high enough to pull my body up with my arms and then swing a leg onto the platform. I had to perform a graceless roll to get aboard that left me laying flat on the deck. It wasn’t a pretty maneuver, but at least I was aboard the boat.

  Grabbing the dry bag and fins, I moved towards the sliding glass door that led into the downstairs salon. Placing my hand on the handle, I held my breath and pulled, expecting the shrill of an alarm. Nothing happened. The door never budged. Allowing myself to breathe again I wasted no time moving on to plan B.

  Having studied the layout of this model boat online, I knew that there was more than one entrance. I climbed up to the flybridge, making sure to keep as low as possible to avoid the cameras that dotted the back of Fowler’s property. I scanned the console, familiarizing myself with the controls and gauges. I also checked for an ignition module on the off-chance that I could avoid breaking into the boat altogether, but I could not find one.

  Another sliding door led to stairs set in the helm console. Holding my breath again I tugged on the door. It slid open with a whispering hiss. I gritted my teeth and closed my eyes waiting on the alarm, but nothing happened. Unable to believe my luck, I opened my eyes and slipped into the boat.

  My eyes adjusted to the darkness of the boat’s interior as I made my way down to the lower helm. I came around the corner from the stairs and saw something that made my blood run cold. Mounted in the corner of the room was the small but unmistakable shape of a security camera. I ducked back behind the wall and pulled the bottom of my dive hood up to cover the lower half of my face, leaving only my eyes exposed.

  Peeking out from behind the corner I glanced around the rest of the large salon area. I couldn’t see any other cameras. Thankful for that, I moved as fast as possible across the dark room towards the camera to get a better look. There were no wires that I could see. Either they were hidden and run through the wall, or it was battery-powered.

  The camera did have a small antenna attached to the back of its body. I surmised that it must be wireless, and would broadcast a feed to a central recording device. Given how rich Fowler was, I was confident that it fed to a remote device on the property as well. Even as careful as I had tried to be, Fowler would have something to show to the police.

  Realizing that there was little I could do, I reached up and turned the little camera so that it pointed towards the wall and then turned my attention to the expansive indoor helm. I scanned the console and wasn’t surprised when, as expected, I found the keys already sitting in the ignition. Many boaters, myself included, leave the keys in the ignition switch for safety and convenience. Having them there saves time in an emergency and ensures that they don’t become lost. However, it also makes the boat much easier to steal.

  Before trying the ignition though, I removed a small flashlight from the dry bag and switched it on. It projected a dull red beam of light that I used to scan the large switch panel mounted on the dash. I found the one marked “VHF,” and switched it to the on position. A moment later I found one marked “Nav Lights,” and turned it on as well. Out of the forward windows, I could see the deck illuminated in a faint white light. It was now time to get out of here before someone noticed.

  Making sure that the engines were in neutral I reached over and turned the key. And once again, nothing happened. Several “idiot” lights came on, casting a strange glow across the cabin, but the engines never turned over. I tried the keys, again and again, nothing happened.

  “Well shit,” I muttered to myself, searchin
g the console for a hint as to why the engines wouldn’t start. My nerves were starting to fray. Finally, I found the culprits. Two covered toggle switches with the word “start,” on them were mounted just above the throttles. Flipping the cover up on one I pressed and held it up. There was a quick electric whine, and then a low deep rumble as the port engine came to life. I winced at the sound but immediately cranked the starboard engine as well.

  Not wasting time to see if anyone noticed the noise, I darted back up the stairs and onto the flybridge. Chancing a quick glance at the house, I could see no changes. The lights downstairs were still on low, and I couldn’t see any movement. I moved down to the main deck and vaulted onto the dock. Two thick yellow cords ran from the side of the boat into a lighted pedestal. I flipped up the cover, making sure to avoid any noise, and disconnected both cables from the shore power and tossed them onto the deck of the boat.

  Despite the low rumble of the two massive diesels, I made sure to remain silent as I untied the huge boat, noting to myself that all the proper navigation lights were indeed on. The last thing I needed was to be stopped for improper lighting. Once the last line from the dock was untied, I hopped back aboard and ran up the stairs to the bridge. I booted up the small handheld GPS that Kelly and I had used to map out the deepest path through the inlet and tossed it on the dash. Glancing behind me for any traffic and giving one last look at the still sleeping house, I clicked both throttles into reverse. And yet again, nothing happened. My heart sank while my pulse leaped into overdrive.

  “What now?” I hissed, slamming the throttles back into neutral, glaring at them with frantic contempt. On the throttle housing, were two little buttons and I almost kicked myself. In my excitement and nervousness I had forgotten that many larger power yachts have a helm selector switch. Punching both of the little square buttons, they instantly lit up orange. After taking a deep breath to calm myself, I clicked both throttles into reverse again, and this time the boat lurched backward.