Choppy Seas (A Rowan Gray Mystery Book 5)

by Lily Harper Hart

  “What do you suggest?” Rowan was genuinely at a loss and wanted answers. “None of those girls saw a thing. In theory, Kasey could be making it up. I wouldn’t put it past her.”

  “I wouldn’t either. That was definitely chloroform, though. I had it tested in the medical bay. That means someone tried to grab that kid.”

  “I wonder if they would’ve returned her once they realized how terrible she was?” The question was out of Rowan’s mouth before she realized how crude it sounded. “Wait … that came out wrong.”

  Quinn chuckled as he shifted so he could rest his head on the pillow and stare at her flushed face. “I know what you were rather clumsily trying to say. I wondered it a bit myself. We’re clearly dealing with an organized effort here, though.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that someone thought ahead to make chloroform. That’s not something that can be replicated with random things found on the ship. Someone brought it with them.”

  “Which means that whoever it was planned on taking at least one girl – maybe more – right from the beginning.”

  “Absolutely.” Quinn bobbed his head as he linked his fingers with Rowan’s and stared at the ceiling. He enjoyed being able to discuss things with her, work them out, without holding back. “Gabby was the first to go missing. The death omen hasn’t appeared for her, so we have to assume she’s still alive.”

  To confirm the statement, Rowan grabbed her camera from the nightstand and flipped through the accumulated photographs. “Still no omen.”

  “That’s good. Check Kasey.”

  Rowan did as instructed. “Kasey is clear. Claire is clear. Leighann still has the new omen in the exact same spot.”

  “So, technically, if we believe what Sally told us – and I have no reason to doubt her – the symbol means danger. So Leighann is in danger.”

  “I guess that’s a step up from two days ago, when the other symbol declared she was going to die.”

  “That is a step up,” Quinn agreed, squeezing her hand. “I swear we’ll spend more time thinking about this new symbol – and what it means for you – as soon as we’re free of this trip. I have to focus on Gabby right now, though.”

  “I want you to focus on Gabby. Focusing on me is self-serving and that’s not who I want to be.”

  “I enjoy focusing on you a great deal. I just need time to think. Those security guards brought up a good point last night. We’ll be docking in Bermuda tomorrow.”

  Rowan tilted her head to the side. “You’re worried about losing control of the situation once we hit Bermuda, aren’t you?”

  “I’m mildly worried,” Quinn conceded. “We’ve been screwing around and heading north for days and I didn’t give much consideration to our destination. Now it feels as if things will turn ugly if I can’t wrap my head around what’s happening.”

  “This isn’t all on you. We’re working together.”

  “I know. I can’t shake the fact that we might lose our guilty party – and Gabby in the process – on Bermuda once we dock.”

  “How is that going to happen?” Rowan challenged. “We simply won’t let anyone leave with luggage, not until we find Gabby.”

  “That right there is exactly what I’m worried about.” Quinn massaged the tender spot between his eyebrows as he stared at the ceiling, the light bouncing off the water through the window and making a pretty pattern on the white backdrop. “I don’t want to get you worked up … .”

  “It’s a little late for that. I guess I’m as high maintenance as you said I was.”

  “You’re only a little high maintenance and it’s cute. I’m fine with it.”

  “I’m not, but now isn’t the time to dwell on it.”

  “Definitely not,” Quinn agreed. “The thing is, I can’t help but wonder if whoever is behind this took Gabby early because he or she didn’t think a poor girl from the city would be missed.”

  Rowan saw where he was going right away. “You think that someone is purposely going after young girls for a reason. Maybe like what we saw right before we set sail. Do you think it’s human trafficking?”

  “I would be lying if I said I hadn’t considered it. Bermuda is a British territory. I did a little research last night while you were taking a shower and sex trafficking is relatively high on the island even though it doesn’t often make the news.”

  “If it doesn’t make the news, how do you know that?”

  “Because I have access to international reports via my position and that’s separate from the news.”

  “Ah.”

  “I’m operating under the theory that a ship full of young girls who are all physically active and probably considered pretty by contemporary standards simply because they’re cheerleaders is a target-rich environment for a predator,” Quinn explained. “Let’s say someone boarded the ship with the express purpose of removing several girls.”

  “To sell them?”

  “Yeah. That’s how it works.”

  “Ugh. I hate these people.” Rowan made a face. “Not everyone on the cruise is with Claire and Leighann’s groups, though, so how does that work?”

  “There are actually a lot more cheerleaders that are outside their two groups but even though there are ten times as many of them they’ve only given us one percent of the problems. They’ve been minding their own business and not causing issues. They’re not really the concern though.

  “There were openings on the room board when the cheerleaders finished booking,” he continued. “The brass didn’t want to let the rooms go to waste so they were sold at a discount because no one wants their vacation to be around cheerleaders and only the truly desperate would bite.”

  “Unless we’re talking about perverts.”

  Quinn cocked an eyebrow. “You make a very good point, sweetheart. That right there is something sensible I didn’t consider. After breakfast, I’m going to be tearing through the manifest.”

  “Maybe you should let me do that. You should be on the deck making sure none of the girls are taken.”

  “I plan on having a meeting with Claire and Leighann after we eat and laying down the law with those girls. No one is to go anywhere alone. I don’t think whoever went after Kasey last night would be stupid enough to attempt a grab in the middle of the day, but stranger things have happened.”

  “Gabby was taken during the day.”

  “I know. We’re going to find her.” Quinn wanted to reassure Rowan because he could feel the worry rolling off her but he wasn’t sure how to do it. “We’re not going to let anyone get off this ship with her.”

  “That’s what I said. You seemed worried about something else happening. It obviously can’t be as simple as I thought it would be.”

  “It’s not,” Quinn confirmed. “I have to believe that whoever grabbed Gabby – and we’re probably dealing with more than one person here – thought they could keep her under wraps without anyone noticing.

  “I mean, think about it,” he continued. “It was obvious that first day that Claire wasn’t paying any attention to her girls. They were easy marks. She paid people to watch them, but Claire’s girls have been running around without supervision for the bulk of the trip.”

  “Gabby is mixed race, though,” Rowan pointed out. “Without sounding like a racist – which I realize is impossible given how this is going to come out – isn’t human trafficking aimed at white girls? I swear I read that somewhere.”

  “You would be surprised. Human trafficking knows no race bounds. White, black, Hispanic, Asian … you name it. There’s a market for every skin tone. There’s also a different … um, purpose … for every girl depending on what the buyers want.”

  “I think I’m going to be sick.”

  “We’re not going to let it happen here.” Quinn was adamant. “My worry is that these guys – and I honestly do think we’re dealing with more than one person – thought they could secret Gabby away and add to their collection before leaving. There are
so many girls on this ship they probably thought no one would notice one was missing until it was too late to do anything about it.”

  “How would they have gotten the girls off the ship, though?” Rowan challenged. “I think we would’ve noticed the girls being carried off.”

  “Unless they were in suitcases. We’re talking small girls here and a lot of tourists take suitcases to port so they can buy multiple things and have a bag with rollers handy for transporting their goods.”

  “Huh. I didn’t even think about that.” Rowan felt even sicker than she had a few moments before. “So they would’ve loaded the girls up in suitcases and just wandered away with them. They wouldn’t have returned to the ship and simply disappeared.”

  “Basically that’s how it works,” Quinn supplied. “The thing is, now we know that something is up. Kasey managed to escape – and trying to grab her that way with so many people around was stupid – and we’re well aware that Gabby is missing. I don’t think our guys are going to try to get off the boat with girls. They would draw too much attention to themselves.”

  “Which means that Gabby is a liability to them,” Rowan realized, swallowing hard. “They can’t get her off the ship, which means they can’t get paid their finder’s fee, which means they have to cut their losses so they can live to grab another girl on a different day, which means she can’t be left alive because she can identify them.”

  “Basically,” Quinn agreed. “I have a lot to do this afternoon, a lot of things to check. We’re going to start going room to room and we’ll begin with people who have denied housekeeping from entering. Hopefully that will help us narrow things down.”

  “What if it doesn’t?”

  “I don’t know. My gut tells me that’s where I should start, though.”

  “I have faith in your gut.”

  “Let’s hope that faith pays off.”

  INSTEAD OF EATING in the main dining room, Quinn and Rowan opted to have breakfast in the employee lounge. It was faster and would allow them to inhale their meals without having to remember to mind their manners.

  They sat with Demarcus and Sally – who were excitable and talking about the previous evening’s big news – and steadily shoveled in food for five minutes before Sally asked the obvious question.

  “You guys look wrecked. Did you get any sleep at all?”

  “We got sleep, but we haven’t really eaten since yesterday morning,” Quinn replied, sipping his orange juice. “It’s going to be a long day so we need to fuel up.”

  “And you have no idea who tried to grab the Witherspoon girl?” Demarcus queried. “I mean … she’s a real pain in the keister, but I would hate to think what would’ve happened to her if she hadn’t managed to get away.”

  “We’re all worried about that,” Quinn said. “My men watched the video and you can’t make out anything other than a shadow. He disappears on the deck. I swear I’m going to make the company invest in better cameras and lights whether they want to or not. We’re supposed to be high-tech and yet we had a camera pointed at that specific area and came up with nothing.”

  “And what about the other girl?” Sally asked, grave. “The one who went missing a few days ago.”

  “We still have no idea where she is.”

  “Could she have gone overboard?”

  Quinn and Rowan exchanged a quick look that wasn’t lost on Sally.

  “We don’t believe that’s the case.” Quinn chose his words carefully. “We believe she’s somewhere, hopefully alive if not entirely safe, and we’re going room-by-room today in an effort to find her.”

  “Uh-huh.” Sally tugged on her bottom lip as she glanced between her friends. “You guys are hiding something.”

  Rowan balked. “That’s not true. Why would you say that?”

  “Because I saw the look you shared and there was something to it. You’re hiding something.”

  “We’re not hiding anything.” Quinn was firm. “I simply looked at her because I enjoy how pretty she is.”

  “And you’re not going to put me off by being sappy,” Sally argued. “You guys know something you’re not sharing. What is it?”

  Rowan was mortified by her friend’s serious expression. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to share her secret with Sally – although she was legitimately worried it would ruin the foundation of their friendship – but she knew it was the wrong time to delve into this discussion.

  Thankfully Quinn was much smoother when it came to deflecting Sally’s intense interest. “We’re not hiding anything. We’ve been discussing possible scenarios all morning and the only ones we’ve come up with … well, they aren’t good.”

  “Do you want to give me an example?” Sally challenged.

  “Okay, for starters, maybe I could believe Gabby accidentally went overboard twenty-four hours ago but that is no longer an option,” Quinn said. “Whoever went after Kasey Witherspoon did so with a plan. Chloroform was involved. You don’t chloroform someone if you don’t want to control them.”

  “Oh.” Sally was mollified, although only slightly. “So what does that mean?”

  “Human trafficking,” Demarcus automatically answered. “That’s the only thing that makes sense.”

  Quinn nodded, his shoulders stiff. “Human trafficking is the obvious answer.”

  Sally’s pretty features twisted. “That’s … horrible. I don’t understand how that would even work.”

  “There are a variety of different scenarios and we can’t be sure which one our culprits are utilizing. It’s probably not important. Once I’m finished here, I’m starting room-by-room searches.”

  “There are more than a thousand rooms,” Sally pointed out. “You can’t search them all.”

  “We can, but we clearly can’t search them all within one day without narrowing down the suspect list,” Quinn countered. “We’re starting with men – mostly because men would have an easier time with the task than women when it comes to the physical side – and we’re going for those who have turned down cleaning service since Gabby went missing.”

  “That will be a much smaller list,” Sally conceded. “What if you’re dealing with more than one person and they move her from room to room, though?”

  “I would hope we’d be able to catch that on the cameras.”

  “You can’t watch every camera every second of the day. There are holes in the surveillance. We all know it.”

  “We do all know it,” Quinn conceded. “This is the best I can do right now, though. Do you have another suggestion?”

  “I honestly don’t.”

  “Then I have to do what I can do.” Quinn snapped a slice of bacon in two and bit into one end, thoughtfully chewing before continuing. “I need you guys to put your staff on alert so they’ll be watching for potential action, too. I am worried that our kidnappers understand that Gabby is now a liability and that they’ll try to do something with her to avoid detection.”

  “You think they might kill her,” Sally noted. “Now that they failed grabbing Kasey and everyone is wary, you think they’d rather kill Gabby than risk releasing her.”

  “I do think that,” Quinn confirmed. “It might be their only option. It worries me a great deal.”

  “Maybe she’s already dead.”

  “She’s not dead,” Rowan barked vehemently. “I would know if she was dead.”

  Sally’s eyes lit with interest. “How would you know?”

  Rowan averted her eyes, her cheeks burning. “I just … um … would.”

  “Right. You just would.” Sally was back to being suspicious. “You guys are good, but I know something else is going on. If you ever feel the need to tell me the truth, I’m available to listen. Until then, I’ll keep my eyes open for Gabby. I know everyone will.”

  Sally slowly got to her feet, her knuckles white she clutched her tray so tightly. “I don’t know what you guys are hiding, but it’s clearly something. You might want to work on your acting skills if you plan to ke
ep this up. It might work on strangers, but it doesn’t work on anyone who has spent more than a few minutes with you.”

  Quinn remained calm even as Rowan internally panicked.

  “We’re not hiding anything, Sally,” Quinn supplied. “I don’t know why you think that, but we have bigger problems to focus on right now than that.”

  “Yeah, we do.” Sally exhaled heavily. “I’ll help you look for Gabby. As for the rest, I guess we’ll deal with it later.”

  “That sounds like a plan to me.”

  15

  Fifteen

  Rowan was antsy after Sally’s departure. Quinn read the slope of her shoulders and knew he would have to take a moment to deal with her before separating for the day. He waited until Demarcus gathered his dishes and left and then followed Rowan to the deck outside the dining room for privacy purposes.

  “I know you’re upset … .”

  “I’m not upset.” Rowan’s expression was unreadable as she hoisted her camera strap over her shoulder and fixed him with a bland look. “Why do you think I’m upset?”

  “Because your hands are shaking.” Quinn pressed her hands together and cocooned them between his. “What Sally said … .”

  “Isn’t important considering what’s going on,” Rowan interjected. “I’m not upset.”

  “You’re upset and I get it.” Quinn stared into her eyes as he internally debated how to proceed. “I like Sally a great deal. She’s always fun and up for a good time. She’s loyal and engaging, too. She’s also more intuitive than I gave her credit for.”

  “Or maybe we’re simply not very good actors and nowhere near as cagey as we thought we were,” Rowan grumbled.

  “Maybe,” Quinn conceded, smiling. “Perhaps it’s a combination of both. Sally is intuitive. She also has a big mouth.”

  Rowan balked. “She’s been nothing but good to me.”

  “And I think she’ll continue to be good to you.” Quinn was serious. “Ro, the thing is, I don’t think Sally is capable of thinking before she speaks sometimes. You’re the one who initially brought this up, if you remember. You can’t go against your initial instincts this late in the game … at least not now.”