by Rachel Lee
Chapter 20
Dugan had to hand it to Veronica: over the next two days, she conducted the excavation as if it were an archaeological dig under her total control. And the interesting thing was, Emilio Zaragosa let her do it.
She took command, telling everyone how it was going to be. Instead of the almost haphazard search Dugan had expected with metal detectors and divers digging up things only to abandon them when they appeared to have no intrinsic value, they followed a careful, methodical plan and all of Veronica’s salvage instructions.
While the Mandolin sat disabled, a line with six colored buoys attached was run out from the Conchita to the launch some sixty yards away. Yacht and launch paced each other while six divers used the line as a guide and followed their marker buoys, ensuring they searched every square inch along the path designated by the boats.
It was pretty effective, too. They brought up a lot of interesting stuff, all of which was dumped in a rubber raft. And by the end of the first day, they brought up some gold bars.
Everyone got excited about the gold. Except Dugan. He was personally disappointed in the bars. He’d been expecting something like the gold bars he’d seen in photographs of Federal Reserve vaults. Instead these bars were thin, uneven, narrow little strips of gold.
And they were unmarked. That got Veronica really excited because they were contraband. Even Emilio seemed rather tickled by the development as they all had dinner aboard his yacht.
Like a goddamn social gathering, Dugan thought as they sat around a table with a snowy white cloth and dined on exquisite delicacies served by a white-coated waiter. Emilio Zaragosa was a strange man.
But Veronica amazed him. She seemed to be totally absorbed in the search, seemed to have completely forgotten that her father was in danger, and that she might be dead in a matter of days.
But that was all show. He saw it in her blue eyes from time to time, as darker things flickered there in quiet moments. She was, in short, doing a damn good job of convincing Emilio they were on the same side. He wondered if the guy was falling for it.
The second day they used the dredges. Dugan hated that. The damn things blew away the muck at the bottom to reveal treasures, and it made things a whole lot quicker, but he still hated it because it muddied the water until visibility was limited, and made him feel as if he were locked in a dimly lit closet.
But they found a lot more gold bars, and some jewelry: gold chains, another jeweled cross, a pair of heavy earrings. They also found more fittings from the ship, cannons, and a brass bell that finally, beyond any doubt, identified the ship, for it was engraved with her name.
Dugan found the bell. He was at the bottom in murky water, his ears filled with the sound of the dredge a dozen feet away, when he saw the glimmer of metal.
His heart nearly stopped, and for a wild moment he thought maybe he’d found the mask. He’d already figured out how he was going to conceal it if he did, even though it had to be as large or larger then a human face and he felt to be sure the bag was still hanging from his belt. All the divers carried the bags for small finds. Unbeknownst to anyone else, Dugan had a second bag tucked inside the first.
If he found the mask. He was beginning to wonder if he even wanted to. Once he found it, Veronica would have satisfied her quest, and would vanish, either back into her own world, or at the end of one of the guns aboard the Conchita. He decided he hated the damn mask.
He brought the bell up at the end of his dive and dumped it into the rubber raft, where they were placing all their finds. Then he swam over to the Mandolin and climbed aboard.
Veronica was there, but Tam still hadn’t surfaced yet. She was hunched over a notebook, writing furiously. Expedition notes, he supposed, as if they’d ever be of any use. He wondered if she’d utterly disconnected from reality.
After he’d gone below to get himself something to drink and eat, he went to sit on deck with her. Tam still wasn’t up. Instinctively, he looked toward the Conchita, and could see binoculars trained on them. They were being towed behind the yacht, and watched constantly. He shifted so his back was to the guy who was watching them. After knowing Veronica, he no longer underestimated people’s ability to read lips.
“You okay?” he asked her.
She looked up, her gaze blank. “Fine.”
“What are you writing?”
“Notes. On the off chance that I might get my excavation back.”
So she hadn’t totally lost touch. She sighed and put the pad aside. “I know I’m probably wasting my time, but it’s easier than thinking about all this.”
“I can understand that. Any bright ideas?”
“No. Only that we’d better find the mask quick.”
“Yeah. I wish.”
Neither of them said anything for a few minutes. Then he asked, “I guess we’re supposed to dine with our captor again tonight?”
“That’s what he said.”
“I don’t get the guy. He keeps treating us like guests all the while he’s pointing guns at us.”
Her mouth twisted. “He’s a civilized criminal.”
“Ahh. That explains a whole lot.”
A while later, her face thoughtful, she said, “He really is a strange man.”
“How so?”
“He seems genuinely excited about the finds we’re making, even the ones that have no monetary value.”
“So?”
“I don’t know. It just doesn’t fit with my idea of a guy who’s willing to kill for money.” She waved a hand as if she couldn’t quite find a way to say what she meant.
He found himself remembering his boss at the brokerage. “He certainly doesn’t act like your standard archvillain. But then I’ve learned something about bad people over the years.”
“Which is?”
“They don’t think they’re bad. They generally think they have good reasons for what they’re doing.”
“That fits Emilio. I keep getting the feeling he’s trying to prove to us that he’s really not a bad guy.”
“You mean the fancy dinners and all that? Yeah. We’re getting treated like honored guests.”
“So maybe he won’t really kill us.”
Dugan tensed. “Don’t start fooling yourself, Veronica. Whatever his motivation, he’ll do whatever he considers necessary to get what he thinks he’s entitled to. He may feel bad about it, but that won’t keep him from doing it.”
She looked away, staring toward the Conchita. After a bit, she nodded. “Have you got any ideas?”
“I’m still thinking like mad. Give me a little more time.”
She glanced again toward the Conchita and waved at the man with the binoculars. “That’s Tomás. I’m being very nice to him.”
“Wise.” He watched as Tomás waved back. “He seems to like you.”
“I’m working on it. He’s the one who’s usually guarding us.”
And to think he’d believed she had totally spaced the whole situation.
“I found something interesting,” he said, and pointed to the rubber raft. “I suppose you’ll get to see it this evening after we dine.” He couldn’t help lacing the word with heavy sarcasm.
“What is it?”
“The ship’s bell. Engraved with her name. It is the Alcantara.”
For an instant her face lit with excitement, and he felt a pang, realizing she hadn’t looked like that for a while. Not since they had made love. Then the expression slid away, replaced by something dark and despairing.
After a few moments, she said, “I know it’s childish, but I feel like throwing a temper tantrum and screaming that it’s not fair.”
He nodded. He kind of felt like that himself. “Stupid me. I thought when I agreed to work with you that I was buying myself a three-month, all-expenses-paid vacation at sea.”
“Yeah?” A short laugh escaped her. “Funny how things turn out.”
“I suppose you would know.”
“Meaning?”
He shrugg
ed. “The accident, losing your hearing.”
“Losing my baby.” She said it, her tone full of a sorrow that he could only imagine. “I think that was the worst part. I mean, I know she wasn’t born yet, and I never got to hold her, but there’s this emptiness . . .” Her voice trailed off and she shook her head.
“You’ll have a child someday.” He knew it was probably the wrong thing to say, but it was all he could think of.
“No, I never will.”
The words jolted him, though he wasn’t sure why. “Why not? Did something happen to make it impossible?”
“No. But I’m not stupid enough to ever let a man that close to me again emotionally.”
“Because one guy was a jerk?” He wondered why he was defending men to her, and why it mattered. It just did.
Her mouth twisted again, and he thought she was going to say something angry, but instead all she did was say mildly, “Because one woman was a jerk?”
“Who? What? Me you mean? Because of Jana?”
She nodded. “It’s been ten years, hasn’t it? You don’t look like someone who’s in a rush to get attached again.”
The instinctive response, “That’s different,” rose to his lips, but he managed to swallow it before he made himself look like an ass. Especially since she was right. And that made him feel even more foolish because he was offering advice he wouldn’t take himself. “So all right,” he said finally.
She surprised him with a laugh. “It’s okay. I’m just not in any rush to feel that kind of pain again.”
“Well, look at it this way. Any guy who falls for you now won’t be upset because you’re deaf.”
“That’s true.”
But her smile faded a little, and he decided it was time to change the subject. “So, what have you been thinking about, apart from the wreck?”
“Thinking about?” She appeared surprised by the question, then shrugged. “My father. Quite honestly, Dugan, I’ve got to see him at least one more time. I’ve got to.”
There was something desperate in her tone that told him they’d moved into some really deep waters here, and that she wasn’t going to be jollied past this. “How come?”
“Because I’ve been so rotten to him.” She put her pen down on her notebook and twisted her hands together. “I haven’t been fair to him. After my accident, I went into a rock-bottom depression.”
“Not surprising.”
But she wasn’t looking at him, and he wasn’t sure she heard him.
“It was like I’d fallen into this dark pit. Everything hurt. It was almost too much effort to breathe. I got out of bed every morning only because Dad insisted on it, then I sat in a rocking chair and stared out the window all day. I don’t even remember if I thought about anything at all. I just sat there and rocked and hurt too much to bear. All I wanted was to die.”
He reached out, covering her hands with his, squeezing to offer what sympathy he could. He’d met that black dog once, in the weeks after Jana had ditched him, so he had at least a small idea of where she’d been.
“Anyway, I lost about six months that way. There was a therapist coming in who was helping me to lipread, but I only went through the motions. And I never really practiced what she taught me. I just didn’t care.
“Then my father learned he had terminal cancer. At the time they told him he had only about six months to live.” She turned and looked at Dugan. “He’s beaten the odds. He’s still around, and he’s in remission. Or at least he was. God, I hope he doesn’t get bad news in Tampa.”
“Me too.”
“Anyway, I guess when he learned he was sick, he got even more worried about me. That’s when he decided to tell me about my mother and the quest. I was so damn angry at him that I could hardly see for days. He gave me this long, typewritten letter, telling me all the things he’d never told me about my mother when I was growing up. God, I hated him for keeping all that from me.”
Dugan made what he hoped was a sympathetic sound, but he wasn’t quite sure why she had been so angry with her father.
“It sounds stupid, doesn’t it,” she continued after a moment. “I look at the whole thing now and I can’t seem to remember why I felt so angry with him. Why I felt so betrayed. I kept thinking that his secrecy had kept me from really knowing my mother. But all it kept me from knowing was part of her work. Her obsession.”
He tugged on her hand, turning her attention to him so she could read his lips. “I can understand being angry because you felt he had been lying to you.”
She nodded.
“But maybe it was more, Veronica.”
“How so?”
“Maybe you hated him for dragging you out of your depression.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I felt pretty bad after Jana. I think I told you. I had some idiotic notion of drinking myself to death or wasting the rest of my life on a beach. I was going to quit life.”
“So?”
“So, learning to live again hurts. It’s a lot easier just to give up. I imagine that made you as angry as any of the rest of it. Maybe more so. He didn’t leave you in your safe little corner in your comfortable little pity party. He told you something that forced you to face life again.”
She nodded slowly, and for several moments closed her eyes. “Maybe you’re right. All I know is, I’ve been so angry and hateful to him since then that I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forgive myself.”
“Well, the good news is, you might not have much time to worry about it.”
She looked astonished and then laughed almost helplessly. “You’re terrible, Dugan.”
“Nah. I’m just a guy. And I don’t believe in guilt. Which isn’t to say that I never suffer from it. But what good does it do? The deed’s done, so get on with picking up the pieces.”
“If I have the opportunity to pick them up.”
He heard the thickening in her voice which told him she was on the edge of tears. He slid over until he was beside her, and put his arm around her. She turned toward him, burying her face in his shoulder, despite the fact that his wet suit offered little comfort.
She didn’t cry. He didn’t know whether that was good or bad, but the tears never came. Little by little she relaxed against him, as if letting go of a terrible tension.
Then she said, without looking at him, “We’re going to die, aren’t we?”
He didn’t know how to answer that. In forty-eight hours, Ginny would start thinking about calling the Coast Guard. He had no idea how long she would wait after that, but he figured not too long. Saturday morning, maybe. At the outside. Then the search would begin. And then Emilio Zaragosa was going to do whatever he believed necessary to protect himself.
Which probably meant getting rid of the witnesses.
Looking across at the Conchita, he saw the rubber raft tethered to the yacht’s side. It was his own raft, co-opted by Emilio, probably so that he couldn’t use it for its intended purpose: escape. And he wondered if there was some way he could get ahold of it.
Veronica stirred and straightened. “Sorry,” she said, wiping her eyes. “I’ll be okay.”
“Sure you will.” But the urge to get her out of this mess was growing stronger by the minute. He figured he had thirty-six hours left. “Listen, I’m suffocating in this wet suit. Let me go make my last dive.”
“Sure.” She gave him a smile, a smile so brave that in spite of himself, he leaned over and kissed her.
“I’ll be back,” he said a là Schwarzennegger. It broadened her smile, and it was her smile he remembered as he went over the side again.
He was feeling fed up even before he submerged. He hated getting in the water as always, but he hated it a hell of a lot more with the dredges. Impatient with the mud they raised, and tired of feeling boxed in, he finally swam away from the guide buoys to the far side of the launch. The water cleared up a little, and he began to run his metal detector around, something to keep himself occupied while he thought ab
out their situation. Something to do in case one of the other divers saw him, an excuse for being so far away from the buoy.
A glance at his watch told him he had to stay down another thirty minutes to satisfy the watchdogs, but he was damned if he was going to do it over there. It would have been different if this had been for Veronica, but it was galling him to be doing it for Emilio.
Besides, he needed some time to think. To think about ways he could get that raft. If nothing else, he might be able to get them away in it after dark. The problem was, Emilio kept a guard on deck all night, and the guard kept an eye on that raft. Taking it would be inviting big trouble.
But they were already in big trouble, he reminded himself. And the trouble was going to get even bigger when Ginny reported the Mandolin missing. Maybe they were getting to the point of having nothing at all to lose. How many more hours was he going to bide his time, hoping some brilliant scheme occurred to him?
On the other hand, how likely was it that he was going to persuade Veronica to leave without the damn mask, unless they were within minutes of being killed? Thinking back to the conversation they had just had, he got even more uneasy. Did she really think Emilio was going to have a change of heart and not kill them?
His estimate of the man was entirely different. He figured Emilio would genuinely prefer not to have to kill anyone, but that wouldn’t stop him from doing what he believed necessary to protect himself . . . and to protect his son. Let us not forget, he told himself, that the man’s son is aboard that yacht. Dugan wasn’t one to underestimate the protectiveness of a parent.
Cripes. It was late Wednesday afternoon. Somehow he had to get them far enough away from here by Friday afternoon that Emilio couldn’t touch them, or he had to find a way to keep Ginny from sending up flares. And Ginny was no dummy. Lies weren’t going to work too well. The woman was an ace at reading between the lines.
Then, of course, even if they got away, what was to stop Emilio from rubbing them out once they got ashore? He’d said he had a man in Key West who would kill Veronica’s father. And Veronica believed that if they found the mask, they’d have the necessary bargaining chip to protect them.