Shattered at Sea

by Cheryl Hollon

  Albert announced that the beginning course was charred beef with parmesan cheese, shaved asparagus with truffle mustard dressing, accompanied by slow-cooked Berkshire pork coated in a sweet and spicy glaze.

  After sampling both, Edward commented, “I think the glazed pork would work well in my pub. I haven’t heard of anyone else in town serving anything like this.”

  Savannah closed her eyes in pleasure after the first bite of the pork. “You won’t be able to keep from running out of this every day. Do it.”

  Everyone was served a hand-selected dry-aged steak in their preferred cut. According to Albert, the beef was raised in Iowa and Nebraska. Each cut was dry-aged in a climate-controlled room for nearly four weeks to achieve the pinnacle of flavor, tenderness, and aroma.

  Although everyone tried to savor the steak as long as possible, it was soon time for dessert. It did not disappoint. It was a chocolate cake with a molten fudge center and vanilla ice cream with a caramelized drizzle.

  After declaring it the best meal she had ever eaten, Savannah left with Edward to check in with the security personnel to see if Ian had been detected using his keycard anywhere on the ship.

  In the elevator going down, Savannah spoke. “That was a weird evening. Did you notice that Albert kept staring at you?”

  “I did, but I thought it was because I dipped my cuff into the mustard dressing as soon as it was served. I wiped it off, but a mustard stain is usually permanent. I’m going to pick up a new shirt at one of the gift shops as soon as I can.” They found Officer Gaffney at his normal position scanning the bank of CCTV screens. He stood up when they walked in. “No, nothing has been recorded from Mr. Morris’s keycard. He can’t possibly be on the ship,” said Officer Gaffney.

  Savannah spoke sharply. “Well, what have you done? I simply can’t understand why there isn’t more action. Don’t you think this might be serious?”

  “Patience, madam. We are following the accepted protocol for a missing passenger that is emotionally unstable.”

  “Oh, no.” Edward put his hands over his ears. “This is a nightmare. I’m sure Ian was well and happy when we boarded this ship.”

  “Has a body been found?” asked Savannah.

  Officer Gaffney turned a darker shade of red. “All the proper procedures are being followed.”

  Savannah turned to Edward. “That’s a no.”

  “True, but we have made some inquiries with his local authorities and there was an attempted suicide, which a constable prevented. It turns out that, in fact, he was less than happy about many issues,” said Officer Gaffney.

  “What issues?” asked Savannah.

  “I’m sorry, we can only discuss these personal details with Ian’s next of kin. His parents are meeting us in Florence in the morning. They tried, but couldn’t get an early enough flight to catch us at Provence. When they arrive, we’ll brief them on the status of our investigation.”

  Edward frowned. “But I’m kin. He’s my cousin.”

  “I’m sorry. You are not listed in his paperwork as his emergency contact. He had listed his father. We’re going to speak to his parents tomorrow. They can share any information they want with you after that. My hands are tied.”

  “Can you at least keep Edward informed if there are any changes?” Savannah held Edward by the arm and started moving him toward the door.

  “Of course,” said Officer Gaffney. “We’ll leave messages on your cabin phone.”

  Edward and Savannah left the security office feeling lower than ever.

  Savannah pushed the elevator button. “Let’s take a stroll on the upper deck. The fresh air may help us think of something we can do.” Savannah held Edward by the upper arm in a double-handed grip. They stood at the railing near Ian’s last sighting. “We’ll be in Florence tomorrow morning. Have you tried Ian’s phone again?”

  Edward started, “It’s been a few hours. Time to try again.” The call went directly to voice mail and he left another message. On this one, he told Ian that his parents would be coming aboard to help the authorities find him. Edward ended the call and resumed looking out over the railing.

  “Do you know what you’re going to tell Ian’s parents?”

  “I have no idea.” Edward’s voice was low and lifeless.

  “Well, one thing is still in our favor.”

  “What?”

  Savannah pressed her lips together. “They haven’t found his body.”

  “I don’t see . . .” said Edward.

  “This isn’t the deepest water here. We haven’t been all that far from shore the entire cruise. If he jumped over on our first evening, he likely would have washed up somewhere by now. Someone should be able to do the tide calculation thing that you see on television.”

  “This isn’t television.” Edward’s voice turned soft.

  “I know this might sound far-fetched, but it’s true. Calculating the tidal effects on a human body is a real science.”

  Edward shook his head from side to side. “Of course, but who can we ask?”

  “We can ask Jacob.”

  Edward crinkled his brow. “He’s back in Florida. He can’t possibly help us.”

  “Yes, he can.” She gave Edward a serious look. “We can use the time difference to our advantage. While we’re asleep, Jacob can do the research for us and then when we get up, his results will be waiting for us.

  “I think this is something that Jacob would love to do. He’s already proved that he’s good with sea charts and his librarian can help him find the tidal effects trends based on the ship’s location in the Mediterranean Sea. If he doesn’t think he can do it—he’ll tell me straight out.”

  “That’s at least something to try,” said Edward. “Then we can give the results to security to make them pay more attention to searching the ship if the science says that he should have turned up by now.” Savannah pushed away from the railing. “I’ve thought of something that Amanda can do to help us.”

  “Okay, what do you want her to do?”

  Savannah grabbed Edward’s arm and they started walking toward the elevators. “I want her to skulk around your past to find out about the Italian counterfeiting ring. She might be able to track down where any of the members are today.”

  Edward leaned back. “You don’t believe me? You don’t believe that I’m not involved anymore?”

  “Of course, I believe you, but I’m not so sure about Ian’s actions after you left for St. Albans, and you didn’t keep in touch with the other members of the counterfeiting ring. You’ve already said that you didn’t know what happened after you left. We should try to find out everything we can.”

  “It doesn’t sound like trust.”

  “You know what I’m always saying . . . ‘Trust but verify.’ That’s what I’m doing.”

  Edward puffed out a breath. “It doesn’t sound like that to me.”

  Savannah put the palm of her hand over her eyes. “Is this one of those Brit/Yank conversations?”

  “I think we’re communicating perfectly,” said Edward.

  “Okay. I trust you.”

  “But I’m not sure. You tend to jump before you think and promise before you’ve thought things through.”

  Savannah bristled, then instantly sympathized. “You are perfectly correct, but it usually works out in the end. This has been an awful day and we’re both tired and grumpy. I’m saying good night. I’ll see you at dawn for breakfast.” Savannah headed for the stair well and sped down the decks to her Spartan cabin before she recalled that she hadn’t kissed Edward before she bolted away.

  I feel like a worm. I’m not being supportive to Edward, and now he thinks I don’t trust him. Way to go. Some girlfriend you are.

  Chapter 14

  Wednesday, Webb’s Glass Shop

  Amanda printed off the last log sheet that Stephanie had e-mailed her for a manual accounting system. Although their previous antiquated system had been unreliable, it had never crashed completely. Looking bac
k, she figured out that they had only two or three manual charges during any of the down times.

  Webb’s Glass Shop’s accountant, Kevin Burkart, knew their Legacy system well and he had his assistant, Stephanie, create the forms for the shop to use until the maintainer could get their new system working. The new guy had dismantled the PC and placed the pieces beside the glass-cutting table.

  The front door bell jangled at Kurt McNally’s entrance. He was the owner of the local computer service only a few blocks away. “Hi, Amanda. I’m not too late, am I? I brought you a coffee from the pub next door. They knew exactly how you like it.”

  Amanda smiled and reached for the coffee. “Thanks, I really need this. My mom had a poor night and the nursing home called me in to help calm her. I didn’t get much sleep.” She took a long drink. “Then, of course, we’ve had the big mess with the accounting system. Thanks for responding on such short notice. I hope you can finish it up today. I lost another customer yesterday. Did you find the part?”

  Kurt lifted an Amazon box for her to see. “Yep, I got the exact replacement part I think is causing your troubles.” He looked over to the torn-down PC. “I should have it up in no time at all.”

  “Why would a brand-new computer need a replacement part?”

  “I think it’s the power supply. That’s how it behaves. If a computer’s brain is its processor, its heart is the power supply. And having one that is underpowered, unstable, or just generally cheap is the most common cause of hardware failure.”

  Amanda frowned. With a pleasant shock, she realized that she liked him. He was thoughtful, easy to talk to, and seemed to enjoy her wicked sense of humor. “Well, don’t rush it or anything.”

  He turned back to look at her and he smiled in perfect understanding. “No rushing from me.”

  “I’ll be checking e-mails if you need anything.” Amanda walked through the classroom to the small office in the back of the store. She sat at the ancient roll-top desk and booted up the computer. She wondered if Savannah would ever replace her dad’s office computer. She shook her head. Of course not. It hadn’t yet been a year since Savannah’s dad had died and, although there were many changes in the everyday running of Webb’s Glass Shop, this office was almost a shrine to John Webb.

  She reflected on her reaction to Kurt. Her last relationship had been an emotional disaster. She had kept secrets, nearly lost Savannah’s trust, and at the end of it lost all confidence in her ability to make good decisions. Perhaps Kurt represented a new start. New starts were good.

  Amanda had worked through most of the routine business, then checked the e-mails to see one had come in from Savannah. Looking at the time stamp, Amanda determined that with the time difference, it had been midnight for Savannah when she wrote the message. Amanda read it quickly and lurched back in the oak desk chair, causing it to shriek like a barn owl.

  Ian was missing!

  Edward must be beside himself with worry.

  Scanning the message quickly, Amanda could see that there was something she could do.

  Good. Her Internet research skills had been helpful to Savannah’s part-time role as an expert consultant to the St. Petersburg Police Department. Amanda wondered who would be foolish enough not to take Savannah seriously on the cruise ship. “They must not know about her past cases. Oh, well, they’ll soon learn.”

  She reread the e-mail and began her task. Her concentration was so deep that when Kurt knocked on the office door, she jumped straight up and out of the chair. “Lordy! You gave me a scare.”

  “Sorry, sorry,” said Kurt. “I thought I’d give you the good news . . .”

  “Oh, wonderful.” Amanda clapped her hands. “It’s fixed?”

  “And the bad news.” Kurt frowned. “The new part fixed the power supply problem, but there’s still a problem with the system.”

  Amanda felt her lips begin to smile but quickly adjusted to a concerned frown. “That’s too bad. Do you need any special parts that might be difficult to find?”

  “No, this is some sort of software initialization bug. I need to trawl through the systems files and I’ll bet I find either a corrupted or missing data file. Do you mind if I stay to keep working on it?”

  “Oh.” Amanda felt her heart leap. She suppressed that and gave out a long sigh. “Well, I must have that system working. It’s vital. We can’t really run off the manual system for more than a few days. It’s been two days already. Customers have begun to say they’ll come back, but they really don’t mean that. They’re going to take their business to our competitor’s shop downtown.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes. People are busy and they don’t have time to wait to buy supplies. They need them right then or their projects are stalled. Frank Lattimer’s shop is downtown. He must be overjoyed to hear that we’re having computer troubles. His prices are about the same as ours, but he stocks inferior quality supplies—disgraceful.”

  “So, you want me to stay?”

  “Until it’s fixed.” Amanda smiled up at him. “Do you need permission from your office?”

  “I’m my only employee.”

  “Perfect,” said Amanda as she pressed her hands together as in a prayer. “Pretty please fix it?”

  “I’m on it until it works.” Kurt beamed a bright smile, spun on his heel, and left.

  Amanda turned back to her research and began the deep dive that it would take to find the information that Savannah wanted. There were several complications to getting anything on Ian’s background. He was British. The time frame was before social media had become mainstream. There was hope, however, in that most public records and newspaper archives had been scanned into searchable databases and were now accessible.

  The schoolhouse clock in the office read nine o’clock when Amanda finished typing up her results in an e-mail to Savannah. She noted that there were several threads that she hadn’t resolved, but noted to Savannah that she expected to find more answers tomorrow.

  “I’ve got it fixed!” Kurt leaned against the office door and his expression broadcast his success. “You need to try it out.”

  “Okay, let me shut this old boy down and I’ll be right out.”

  She quickly tidied up the office, powered off the computer, locked the back door, and grabbed her enormous handbag before going through the classroom to meet Kurt at the sales counter. “Oh, it’s all done!”

  “Yes, I put it all back together and it works great. I don’t think you’ll have too much trouble figuring out how to work it, but I wanted to give you the complete operational drill before I left.”

  “That’s wonderful!” Amanda grabbed Kurt by the shoulders and planted a huge kiss on both cheeks. “You have no idea how great this is!”

  Kurt looked dazed, his cheeks red where Amanda had kissed him. “Right, I have no idea.”

  Amanda plopped her handbag on the counter and rubbed her plump hands together as if warming them. “Now show me how to work this beast.”

  “It’s pretty intuitive,” he started, but Amanda interrupted.

  “No, no, no! I’ve heard that before. I want a blow-by-blow tutorial followed by a full shutdown and then another full start-up. Then, and only then, will I allow you to take me for a drink at Queen’s Head Pub.”

  Kurt grinned. “My pleasure on both counts.”

  Chapter 15

  Thursday, approaching Florence

  Savannah woke before dawn and looked out her tiny porthole. The ship was cruising slowly along a rocky cliff. Good. The ship hadn’t docked yet. Watching the huge ship dock was one of the events that Savannah wanted to see.

  But first, she wanted to fire up her laptop, check her e-mail, before she met Edward for breakfast and then heading with him to the secluded area on deck 14 to watch the maneuvers.

  She read through Amanda’s initial search results. Amanda had found an obscure article in one of the London papers about dockworkers who had found salvation from their crime-ridden lives in the arts. That obsc
ure hint inspired Amanda to a surprisingly creative search that led to glassblowing as one of the recovery arts. Amanda thought that one of the glassblowers working on the ship might be one of those reformed scam artists.

  Savannah leaned back in her chair. Eric or Alan involved in the currency scam? That was a result from left field. She read the rest of the e-mail. Amanda couldn’t confirm more until she had their personal details. Savannah replied with everything that had come up in casual conversation along with their full names, hometowns, and descriptions of both members of the glass-blowing team.

  Given the difficulty Alan was having with his memory after the Vespa hit-and-run, Savannah wondered if it could be Eric. He was certainly large enough to be thought of as a thug, but she hadn’t seen that kind of behavior out of either one of them. Was bullying something you could turn on and off depending on the situation? She resolved to watch both closer during the next demonstration.

  She dressed as quickly as she could and dashed to catch the elevator up to deck 14. Edward was pacing in front of the elevator doors.

  “I’m so sorry. I was such an idiot last night.” Savannah’s words tumbled out in a rush as she stepped into his arms. “I behaved horribly and added grief while you’re already dealing with tons.”

  “It’s all right,” he whispered. “We were both upset.”

  “Have you heard anything?” asked Savannah.

  “Not a peep.” He hugged Savannah for a long moment. “I’m dreading this morning with my aunt and uncle.”

  “Let’s not worry about that yet. I have some news from Amanda. But, first let’s get some coffee and food.” They picked out a hardy full English-style breakfast at one of the food stations with fried eggs, sausages, broiled tomatoes, baked beans, and grilled mushrooms. They both turned down the blood pudding but piled on the fried bread.