When the Bob Marley music stopped, Nadia went into the wheelhouse in search of something to eat. “How much longer?” she asked.
Reid took a bite of her peanut butter and banana sandwich and glanced at her wrist watch. “About two hours,” she mumbled with a mouthful of food, then smacked the side of the helm station where the stereo was located. The CD skipped a couple of times, then started back up with another song as Reid fixed her eyes on the horizon.
Nadia simply nodded and went down into the cabin. She remembered they’d purchased granola bars, but couldn’t locate them as her growling stomach told her anything would do at this point. Passing on the can of sardines, she settled on a packet of cheese and crackers.
Louie stepped into the wheelhouse just as Nadia walked back out to the stern. Reid turned her head, following Nadia with her eyes. She finished her sandwich and stood up, stretching her back as Louie sat down at the helm, giving her a short break.
*
Nadia leaned against the port gunwale, eating her crackers and moving to the music. The boat rolled over an unexpected wave and Nadia nearly went over the side. Reid grabbed her, wrapping her arms around Nadia’s waist and pulling the young woman back against her.
“Don’t stand near the edge unless you want to go swimming,” Reid murmured, letting her go. She stepped around her as she went to check the fishing line.
Nadia swallowed the lump in her throat from nearly falling overboard and feeling the warm, strong body against her. She watched in silence as Reid stretched her face towards the sun before going back into the wheelhouse.
*
“If you hit that wave on purpose, I’m going to toss you in the water,” Reid growled.
“Oh, come on,” Louie laughed. “You went to go lecture her on standing by the rail. Why not catch her instead?”
Reid shook her head. “Go catch us some damn fish before I turn you into our next meal!”
Louie walked out of the wheelhouse, snickering and singing along to Bob Marley’s One Love.
“Is that hard to do?” Nadia asked, as Louie grabbed the rod and reeled his line in.
“Fishing?” he questioned, looking halfway at her as he checked his artificial lures.
Nadia nodded.
“No. It’s mostly luck, but if you don’t have any patience, you’ll waste your time. That one in there,” he said, pointing his thumb towards the wheelhouse, “can’t fish for shit,” he added, tossing the line back out to the starboard side of the prop wash.
Nadia laughed.
Louie set the rod back into the holder and opened the hatch compartment a few feet away, taking out another fishing pole. Nadia watched him rig it with the same triple hook set up, but he used a different type of lure on this pole. When he was finished, Louie tossed the line into the water off the port side and loosened the drag to let the line go out much further.
“Here you go,” he said, sticking the rod into the holder close to her. “If the tip bends over, grab the pole, pull it back hard, and start winding the reel like this,” he added, imitating the motion for reeling in a big fish.
“So, how do you and Reid know each other?” Nadia asked as she watched the pole near her, unsure what it should actually look like.
“She saved my life,” Louie stated matter-of-factly. “We’ve been good friends ever since.”
*
With only a half hour left in their journey, Nadia’s fishing pole bent over. She yelled and Louie rushed to help her reel it in. They fought together, him keeping her from going out of the boat with the pole, and her keeping the pole in the boat. Reid quickly slowed the boat, cutting the engine as she raced back there to help them. She grabbed the gaff that was attached to the inside of the gunwale and waited for the fish to break the surface as Louie and Nadia reeled it in.
When the small, yellowfin tuna showed its head, Reid gaffed it, pulling it up against the side of the boat, then over the rail. Louie was ready with the fish bat, quickly smacking it in the head to kill it.
“Tuna steaks for dinner!” Reid cheered, high-fiving him.
“I’m glad she can fish!” he laughed, pointing at Nadia, who was staring with doe eyes at the lifeless fish.
“Come on, get it cut up and into the freezer so we can get out of here. We’re almost to San Salvador and we’re in too deep of water to anchor. I don’t want to drift too far,” Reid stated.
Louie got the filet kit out of the compartment and began cutting the fish right there on the deck of the boat. Nadia turned away as he cut off the head, then began peeling back the skin.
“Don’t worry, you’ll forget all about what it looked like when you eat it,” Reid murmured.
“I don’t think I can eat it,” she grimaced.
“Don’t tell me you’re a vegetarian.”
“No. I’ve just never had to kill and prepare my own food like a barbarian.”
Reid shrugged and went back into the wheelhouse to check the radar. As soon as Louie had finished, they shoved the meat into sealed bags and stuffed them into the freezer. The fish was a baby, but had enough meat for three good-sized steaks.
Louie turned on the washdown hose that pumped in seawater to spray the blood and guts off the deck of the boat. Then, he reeled in the other pole and stowed the fishing gear. When he turned and gave Reid a thumbs up sign, she started the engine and pushed the throttle forward.
FIVE
The Cockburn Town marina on San Salvador Island was buzzing with activity when Reid pulled the Lady Pearl up alongside the dock. A large, blue and white research vessel with Ocean Works Research written on the side and the name R/V Sea Rascal scrolled on the side of the bow, was tied up further down. Louie quickly jumped onto the dock, tying the bow line to a cleat while Reid tied the stern line from inside the boat.
“Come on,” Reid said, locking the wheelhouse door.
Nadia put her t-shirt back on as she followed Louie and Reid down the dock, past a couple of cruisers and a sailboat.
A woman who resembled a young Halle Berry with long, thin dreads, walked out of the marina bar as they were passing by. She stepped up to them, wrapping her arms around Reid’s neck and locking lips with her. “I knew you couldn’t stay away,” she said teasingly.
Reid laughed and extricated herself. “This is Esmeralda or Esi to most people,” she stated, introducing the woman. “I’m not staying. I’m not in town long, only to see an old friend who owes me a favor.”
Esi hugged her again. “Don’t be a stranger.” She smiled and winked before going back into the bar.
“Do you have a woman in every port?” Nadia spat sarcastically.
Reid gave her a cheeky grin, but didn’t answer as they headed towards the ship moored at the end of the dock.
“Is Jonathan Meeks aboard?” Reid asked when she came in contact with one of the ship’s crewmen who was standing on the dock, smoking a cigarette.
“Dr. Meeks is in the lab,” he said, pointing towards a gray and white building a hundred yards away that looked more like a small storage shack.
‘Thanks,” she replied, nodding for Louie and Nadia to follow her.
They were halfway to the building when a slim-built man, about Reid’s height, walked out, carrying a box. His bushy, auburn hair was sticking out from under a ratty looking hat that had OWR stitched on the front of it. His baby-face was slightly scruffy from not shaving for the past two days. He cocked his head to the side, squinting his eyes behind a black pair of vintage looking sunglasses from the eighties.
“Cavanaugh?” he called out.
Reid smiled brightly. “Jonnie boy!” she replied, rushing up to give him a hug.
“I heard you were dead,” he said with a thick British accent.
Reid laughed. “Not likely. I was in Tanzania with Mary Anne.”
“Oh, I heard about that. What a beauty, huh? I wish I could’ve been there for that one.”
“Yeah. I hated to leave her behind, but I have better things to do. Which is why I’m
here. I need to borrow some equipment.”
“What kind of equipment?”
“Side scanning sonar, a tow-fish, a half dozen dive tanks, two full apparatuses, a mooring buoy, a suction dredge with a pump, two handheld metal detectors, an underwater camera, a satellite phone, and maybe a thru-hull video system if you have one.”
“What the hell are you doing, looking for the Titanic?” he laughed.
“No. I’m going after the Duchess,” she replied.
He set the box down and pulled off his sunglasses. “Reid,” he sighed. “People waste their entire lives trying to find ships that are known to exist and never find them. You’re going after a myth.”
“I know she’s out there, Jon,” Reid said seriously. “And I know where she is.”
“I still don’t think it’s a good idea.”
“What if I hadn’t been looking for the Monarch?” she stated, raising an eyebrow.
The Monarch was a passenger plane full of people that supposedly vanished in what is known as the Bermuda Triangle. One of the passengers was said to have been traveling with a suitcase full of gold bars. Reid spent a year researching the plane’s flight log and last coordinates, then spent another year searching for the wreckage. During her search, she found an anomaly on the sea floor. Her friend Jon was just starting out as an oceanographer, so he was eager to work on anything. She gave him the coordinates, telling him it looked like nothing she’d ever seen before and definitely wasn’t the structure of a ship or plane.
Jon wound up finding ruins at that site that dated back over four-thousand years. The discovery boosted his career off the ground and he joined Ocean Works research, later becoming the principal scientist and director of research on the R/V Sea Rascal, leading the exploration and research cruises for that ship.
Reid went on to find a wing and part of the tail of the Monarch that were near a sea cliff that dropped down over three miles into oblivion, leaving the remainder of the wreckage gone forever.
“Most of everything I have is allocated to the Rascal and we’re heading out in two days, however there’s some backup equipment in storage that you can borrow. It’s a little out-dated, but everything works fine,” he said, scratching the auburn colored fuzz on his chin. “I’ll be right back.”
Reid checked her watched, noting they had enough daylight left to make it to their next stop. Louie struck up a conversation with the ship crewman and Nadia sat on the edge of the dock with her feet dangling over the side while they waited.
It took Jon fifteen minutes to return. He was pushing a cart that had a large, yellow case on it, with two smaller yellow cases beside it and two black cases on top of them. A big red ball was also on the cart.
“Here’s the side scanner, handheld metal detectors, UW camera, and mooring buoy,” he said. “This tow-fish is one for ferrous and non-ferrous metals,” he added.
“Perfect,” Reid said.
“Where’s your boat?”
“It’s the Downeast on the other side of that sailboat.” Reid pointed as they walked down the dock.
“Where did you get this?”
“Guillermo,” Reid replied, stepping onto the stern with Louie to take the equipment.
Jon shook his head. “When are you going to stop dealing with that crooked gringo?”
“Hey!” Nadia snapped, stepping up next to the cart.
Reid looked at Jon and rolled her eyes. ‘This is Nadia…Guillermo’s daughter.”
“Seriously?” Jon laughed. “What the hell have you gotten yourself into Cavanaugh?”
“Don’t ask,” she mumbled.
Jon pulled the empty cart away from the boat. “I’ll be back in a few minutes with the suction dredge and dive tanks. I’m not sure if we have any SAT phones that are online. I’ll check. We don’t have a thru-hull, so the side scanner will have to do. How deep will you be diving?”
“I don’t know, probably a hundred max.”
“I’ll add in a decompression line just in case.”
“Thanks,” Reid called as he pushed the cart down the dock.
“That guy has a lot of nerve,” Nadia growled.
Reid sighed. “Your father isn’t who or what you think he is. He hasn’t been on the straight and narrow for years. Maybe if you visited him more, you would know what he’s really all about.”
“I do visit and that’s none of your business,” Nadia huffed, crossing her arms.
“I’ve been dealing with him for six years. In that time, he’s never once mentioned you and I’ve never seen you around.” Reid shrugged.
“Haven’t you been gone a while?” Nadia countered.
“Yes, three years. Did you visit during that time?”
“Once,” Nadia mumbled.
“My case in point.”
“Why are we talking about me? You’re the one who screwed him over. That’s why I’m on this damn boat.”
“No. You’re on this boat because you pissed daddy off.” Reid shook her head. “I’m not stupid, Nadia.”
Louie cleared his throat loudly. Reid turned to see Jon coming down the dock with the rest of their equipment.
“Here’s the last of it,” Jon said. “The SAT phone is registered and ready to go. It gets a shitty signal though.”
Reid, Louie and Nadia worked together storing the equipment.
“Thanks. You definitely did me a solid.” Reid smiled, shaking his hand.
“Be safe out there.”
“Will do.”
“My ass is on the line if something happens to that equipment,” he warned.
“We’re good. Don’t worry so much.” She grinned and waved as she went into the wheelhouse.
SIX
Nadia watched her walk away, trying not to look at the rounded muscles protruding from the tank top she wore and the tight calves of her smooth legs. Nadia had found Reid attractive the minute she saw her with that sexy, untamed hair and cheeky grin. There was something about the complacent, easygoing woman that made Nadia want to smack her, yet looking into Reid’s beautiful green eyes made Nadia want to know everything about her.
Despite all of that, as much as she’d wanted to hate Reid for calling her out, she was right. Nadia hadn’t exactly been the best daughter, but the relationship between her and her father was strained and had been for many years, ever since her grandmother died and he came into money. She was starting to see more and more of his egocentric personality when she visited, especially where others were concerned. He acted more like a boss than a father. His latest ploy of sending her on this trip in the middle of nowhere, to babysit a stranger who owed him money, instead of giving her the inheritance that she was birth-righted, was the final straw. If Reid really did know what she was doing and was able to find whatever treasure she was looking for, then her father could wipe his own ass with his family’s money for all she cared.
Nadia turned her eyes back to the horizon. All she saw around her was light blue sky and dark blue ocean. There wasn’t a speck of land in site, not even another boat. Her cell phone had lost its signal a long time ago, so she’d turned it off and stowed it in her bag. She had nothing to do, except stare at the water and listen to the god-awful island music that blared over the stereo speakers. She wondered if the island lifestyle was something you were born with or simply acquired overtime. Sure, the islands were fun, the water was pretty, the weather was great, but what else was there? It was like being on constant vacation. Even her father, who had always been a well-dressed, prim and proper gentleman, was dressing in floral pattern shirts and letting his hair grow out into a thick bushy mess. The islands had a very low-key, unkempt atmosphere that she wasn’t sure she could get used to. Life back home in Greece was nothing like the islands. In fact, she didn’t live anywhere near the ocean, and she spent all of her time with the family business, a restaurant and bakery that had been around for over a hundred years. A business she would more than likely take over one day since she didn’t have any siblings, and her aunt’s
sons acted like uneducated gigolos.
The islands had their appeal. That’s part of the reason she visited her father. Even before he moved from Italy, going to visit him had always been her escape; her way to free herself from the clutches of her mother and grandparents, who smothered her. Spending summers in Italy with her father and his mother after her parents’ divorce, was a breath of fresh air, until his mother passed away and he abruptly moved to the Caribbean. Guillermo had bounced from island to island until he wound up in the Bahamas, where’d been for the past seven years.
Thinking back to her current situation, Nadia chuckled. If her grandfather knew where she was, what she was doing right now, and why, Reid wouldn’t have to worry about paying Guillermo back. Nadia’s Greek grandfather would skin him alive. Gustav Stavros hated Guillermo Franchino. He bit his lip so hard, it dripped blood the day he found out his daughter, Athena, was marrying the Army man from Italy who was fifteen years her senior. He tried to stop the wedding, but when he found out Athena was pregnant, he gave his blessing, not wanting his first grandchild to be born illegitimately.
Guillermo was stationed back in Italy two years later, taking his wife and young daughter with him. Five years after that, he retired from the Italian Army and they moved back to Macedonia. He wasn’t happy from the start. Gustav was very hard on him. He’d disapproved of Guillermo from the beginning and treated him like an outcast because of it. By the time Nadia was nine, her parents had divorced and her father moved back to Italy with his mother.
When Nadia was a teen, her grandmother passed away, leaving Guillermo, her only child, the coastal property that had been in her family for four generations. Within a year, he’d sold it, pocketing more than enough money to live on for the rest of his life. Since he only had one child, a percentage of the property was to be given to Nadia when she turned eighteen. However, her father sold it before that, telling her he put her percentage of the money into an inheritance account that she could withdraw from whenever she felt like it. The only catch, he owned the account, so she had to visit him to get anything from it.
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