The Sam Reilly Collection Volume 2

by Christopher Cartwright

  In that time she’d put all her energies into fixing it. Instead of drowning in the time and effort required to help her own child, she had fixated on changing the status quo and improving the environment so that no one else had to bear the same experience.

  Instead of going on to study medicine, Vanessa changed to a Master of Environmental Sciences. She studied mostly in the evenings. She slept little. Her parents were still alive and she burdened them with longer and longer hours with her son. She became distant with her husband. It wasn’t that she no longer loved him. It was simply a case that she no longer had time to love anyone. In truth, all she wanted was to change the world. Revenge, she discovered, was as powerful a motivator as fear, and it drove her away from the family she should have loved completely.

  Afterwards, she got a job with the Environmental Protection Agency. At first it satisfied her need to punish companies and people who managed them. Each fine she issued, or case she brought before a court, somehow made her feel as though she was making the person responsible for her own child’s pain pay. It was foolish, she knew, but still it felt good.

  For a time, she felt as though she was making a difference. That, somehow, what she was doing served a purpose. But then she saw how the penalties demanded of the companies who were destroying the environment were nowhere near enough of a deterrent to force the companies to act decently. In many cases, the companies had performed a simple cost versus benefit analysis and found that it was cheaper to pay the fine than it would have been to work in a safe manner to begin with. If she ever really succeeded in a major windfall, the company would simply appeal in one of the several legal avenues for recourse, so that it would be years before anything would be achieved.

  This made her more fanatical, and drove her to achieve more. The EPA demanded more hours of her, and further study to stay ahead of the next culprit. The companies would often simply purchase the expert opinions of others to satisfy their objectives by providing false perspectives. And then, the only solution she could see was to study more.

  By the time she was thirty-two, she went back to university for the third time in her life. This time, to complete a doctorate in environmental sciences. She mistakenly believed that to beat people in this game, she would need to increase her knowledge base.

  After the first year of her third degree, Brian left her. She didn’t blame him. How could she? After all the hours that her chosen field demanded of her, it left no room for intimacy or family.

  Three more years of study, and she had successfully completed her Doctorate. Now, she’d thought, she was armed with the knowledge base required to change the world. It took her another two years, and finally the death of her son, before she discovered that she’d been absolutely wrong about everything.

  Her son had died aged nine, during winter after contracting viral pneumonia. He was unable to shake it due to his multitude of lead poisoning related illnesses. She walked in to check in on him on her way to work at 4:30 a.m. one morning. At first she thought he was just in a very deep sleep. She thought he looked so very peaceful.

  Vanessa had walked into his bedroom to see him for a moment, and give him a kiss before going to work. Instead, she greeted his lifeless body. The ventilator that her son had now lived with for nearly nine years, was still going, mechanically causing his chest to rise and fall. He hadn’t changed much since she’d kissed him goodnight before going to bed, but in an instant, she knew that he was dead.

  She sat down next to his bed and cried. To her dismay, she knew that they weren’t tears of loss, but to her shame, tears of relief.

  Vanessa contacted her boss at the EPA that very day, and quit.

  It was the catalyst that changed her life. Suddenly she realized how wrong she’d been all this time to think that she could change the world by simply enforcing rules. No, for her to make the world a truly better place, she would have to do so by changing everything from the top down. She needed people to think differently. To do that she would need to commit to something more than she ever had before.

  And that meant that she would have to reach the top. Politics was the only way to really change the view of the people. To really make a difference. The difficulty was to not become lost in the corruption required to achieve it.

  The crowd started chanting her name.

  It brought her mind back to the present. They had come a long way since that day nearly thirty years ago when her son had been poisoned. Her thoughts considered the current lead poisoning case in the town of Flint – but there’s so much further to go.

  She smiled. Her life’s ambition had begun. As she rolled the die of chance she wondered where it would end. Her acceptance speech had been well received, and she wondered for an instant if she might actually have a chance at winning.

  As she smiled for the cameras, Vanessa wondered if America could ever accept an environmentally friendly President.

  The faces smiled back at her.

  Yes, they could.

  Fear, she understood, was a powerful motivator. She’d been lucky to make it this far. All she needed now was an environmental disaster to strike the heart of America, and she might have a real chance at winning the Presidency.

  Chapter Seventeen

  The Maria Helena’s massive twin 44, 000 HP diesel engines turned her powerful screws through the water. Her steel bow sliced through the calm waters. The swell was low, and the barometer showed a high. They would be in for a nice few days at sea. On the bridge, Sam stared at the admiralty charts which mapped the region. Standing next to him was Matthew, his conservative skipper. One look at the man’s hazel eyes and cordial smile, and you knew exactly what the man was thinking – there’s no such thing as the Bermuda Triangle.

  He glanced at the fanciful map of the Bermuda Triangle, superimposed on the area in which all four rogue waves had recently done so much damage. Within the Atlantic Ocean, an imaginary triangle formed between Bermuda, Miami and Puerto Rico. Contrary to popular beliefs, research gathered by both the American Bureau of Shipping and shipping underwriters Lloyd’s of London show no statistical increase in maritime risk or insurance claims within the area.

  Sam grinned as he plotted a GPS marker to a point along the eastern edge of the supposedly deadly triangle. A place where all three cargo ships and one sailing vessel had been severely damaged or sunk as the result of a rogue wave. He marked the exact location of each rogue wave with the letter R. The last one being the Mirabelle, which was a sailing vessel, designed for blue water sailing. The Mirabelle had previously won the Open Forties Challenge, which was a circumnavigation of the globe, by any means, as long as they maintained latitude below 40 degrees south. By comparison, Bermuda was like sailing in a millpond. Sam then plotted the areas highlighted. They were all within a five-mile radius. An area comparable to finding four needles in the same location within a field of haystacks.

  Sam grinned as he plotted the course for the GPS waypoint. “That’s where we’re headed, Matthew.”

  Matthew looked at it and nodded his head. Checked the instruments and then let the autopilot take over. “That’s some coincidence isn’t it?”

  “There’s no coincidence about it. There’s something there, and I’m going to prove it.”

  Matthew shook his head. “You’re not really starting to buy into this rubbish about rogue waves being intentionally created?”

  “No. Not for a minute. But something mortally wounded all four of these ships. And I intend to find out who was responsible, and just how they’ve done it.”

  Matthew made the slight course adjustments, steering to a slight angle no more than five degrees off the waves running towards their port side, to avoid the discomfort of pounding by the oncoming waves. After a minute, confident that the Maria Helena had settled into a comfortable rhythm he said, “Just like your father. You need scientific answers where coincidence and luck seem to play the biggest part.”

  Tom Bower looked up from where he was lounging at the far end
of the bridge, reading a book. “That’s not true. Well, not in this case, anyway.”

  “Really?” Matthew replied, looking back where Tom had already returned to his book, apparently disinterested in their discussion. “What’s he interested in then?”

  Tom grinned, marking his book with a dog’s ear. “Sam thinks this is going to prove his hypothesis about the Bimini Road.”

  Sam laughed out loud, but said nothing. He stood up, as though he were about to make a counterargument, and then sat back down again. Keeping his mouth firmly shut having thought better about it.

  “What about the Bimini Road?” Matthew asked.

  Tom smiled. “Sam here had a theory going back more than ten years ago when we were still in our twenties that an ancient tribe built the Bimini Road. Part of his theory was that the ancient tribe used it to sink invaders or at least damage their ships enough that they were easy plunder.”

  Matthew looked at Sam, trying to determine if there was an ounce of truth in Tom’s words. Sam smiled sheepishly.

  “Holy shit Sam! You were a believer?”

  “Enjoy your laugh. Let’s see who finds the first answers.”

  “Sam and I even spent a few weeks on vacation diving the place before I was convinced that it was nothing more than a natural formation of rocks.”

  “Rocks that aren’t found anywhere else in the area and clearly do not match up with the surrounding sand,” Sam pointed out.

  “Yes, well I didn’t say I had the answer. The point is, Sam’s been fascinated by the Bimini Road since we were kids. No wonder he jumped at this case.”

  Matthew rolled his eyes. “So Sam, what the hell’s so interesting about the Bimini Road?”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Sam wanted to wait until he’d had time to find what he was looking for at Bimini Road before he explained his entire crazy scheme. He looked at Matthew’s hazel eyes. They told him the skipper wanted answers before he risked bringing the Maria Helena anywhere near the trouble.

  Sam took a drink of lemonade. He considered how much to tell Matthew. And then he began talking about one of the first maritime mysteries he’d ever tried to solve.

  Sam opened his laptop screen. Scanned through several files labeled Archives until he found the one he wanted. It was named Bimini Road. He clicked on it and several files came up. Sam opened the first one, revealing an image of an old oil painting on canvas.

  It was a depiction of a trimaran made from the cut outs of massive tree trunks. The old boat was completely flat with no mast or sail. It appeared as though it was simply paddled by dozens of occupants. A closer inspection showed wooden carvings most probably used as cleats and a basket of woven leaves. The purpose of which, was entirely unknown.

  “What do you see?” Sam asked.

  Matthew bent down to look at the image. His expression told Sam everything – it wasn’t the first time he’d shown Matthew some obscure image or location and asked him what he made of it. The man smiled patiently – after all, Sam was still his boss.

  “I’m not an art critic, but I’ll give it a try.” Matthew expanded the image and began focusing on individual aspects from the right to left. “At face value, I see an old painting of a pre-industrial trimaran. The hull looks to have been cut out from large tree trunks – possibly oak or pine, I couldn’t be sure. The vessel looks primitive but strong. I see several dark skinned people inside waving axes and showing their perfectly white teeth. I see no mast, sails or rigging. In the left hand corner there’s a basket with woven leaves.”

  “Go on. What about the people?” Sam persisted.

  “They’re dark skinned. Wearing nothing at all. They are short and very stocky. Perfect for stabilizing in rough seas.”

  “Not just stabilizing in rough seas – raiding ships.”

  Matthew smiled. “Ships already floundering?”

  “Yes. Ships already struck by a rogue wave. Already in trouble – and then attacked.”

  Matthew zoomed back so the entire image of the painting became visible again. “They look like happy people. You got all that from this painting?”

  Sam laughed. “They’re called the Antiqui Nautae. Its Latin translation means the Ancient Seafarers.” Sam pointed at the basket of woven leaves. “It has been said that they used those intricately woven leaves as giant kites to help move their ships over large distances at great speed. One of the theories is that the Antiqui Nautae used the strange shape of the Bimini Road to change the size and shape of the swell as it flowed over the strange rock formation. In doing so, they created a large swell or even a small rogue wave, which they then used to disarm or de-mast ships during the 17th century. Providing them with the unfair advantage required to beat Britain’s Man-o-Wars, Spain’s Frigates, and pirates who all had a significant technological advantage over the primitive seafarers.”

  “Are you saying they built the Bimini Road?” Matthew interjected.

  “No! Well maybe. Numerous maritime archeologists have studied the strange formation of underwater stones. And despite being a strange phenomenon they all agreed the thing is entirely natural.”

  Matthew stared at the admiralty charts of the area surrounding North Bimini Island. “So then how did the Antique Nautae use it?”

  “I believe they learned through experience that the sea responded uniquely under certain circumstances. For example, a strong easterly wind after a king tide. I’m really not sure what the conditions were. But, in theory, a certain type of event caused the Bimini Road to produce a rogue wave.”

  “Interesting theory. Do you know where they lived?”

  “No idea.”

  Tom put his hand on Sam’s shoulder. “It’s a good theory. The only problem with the entire thing is that there’s absolutely no evidence that the Antique Nautae ever existed.”

  Sam laughed. “That’s not entirely true. There were reports of more than a dozen large ships being lost in these seas during the 17th century. And then there’s this oil painting.”

  “The oil painting could be of any number of early seafaring cultures, or it could have just as easily been an image from the artist’s own fantasy. As for the ships going missing – hundreds of ships were lost with no traces during the 17th century along the coast of the Americas.”

  Sam grinned. He was just about to prove a long standing theory of his. “Yes, well we’re going to find the truth in the next few days. A bottle of Grange says I’m right?”

  Matthew stared at him. “I’m not a betting man.”

  Tom intervened. “I’ll take that bet.”

  “You seem confident,” Matthew said.

  “Well, there’s one more thing. Even if Sam was right we’ve dived the Bimini Road many times before. And never seen signs of any shipwrecks.”

  “That’s because we never knew where the rogue wave would finally form and strike its target.”

  “And now we do?” Tom asked.

  Sam brought up the GPS coordinates of all three of the cargo ships recently severely damaged by the rogue waves. “Now we do.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Their private Sea King helicopter flew overhead and circled the Maria Helena once. At its control, Tom recognized Veyron, their chief engineer. In the passenger seat, a young woman was just visible.

  “Are we expecting visitors?” he asked.

  Sam smiled at the sight. “No. Veyron’s returning after picking up our latest crew member.”

  “I didn’t know we were taking on new staff?” Matthew asked.

  “We’re not. This is an old member, who I’ve asked to relocate on board the Maria Helena because of a hunch.”

  “Elise?” Tom asked.

  “Yes.” Sam confirmed that they were going to meet his highly illegal, computer genius, who often provided them with unique and often just as illegal intel.

  The helicopter landed. The rotor blades settled to a stop, and then both doors opened. Veyron stepped out the right side door and immediately set about connecting the Sea Ki
ng’s locking harness so that it didn’t get accidentally knocked off the Maria Helena’s deck. The second occupant got out the opposite side and walked towards them.

  She looked nothing like what Tom had expected. Not that he really knew what he expected. Despite talking to her hundreds of times over the phone, he’d never met her. Had no idea where she lived or what she looked like. Sam had once told him that Elise had intentionally done so. Her parents had died before she was five and the CIA had kind of adopted her when a routine school assessment showed that she was in the finite 0.001 percent of the population capable of breaking impossible codes. She was taught code breaking and computers by the best of them at the CIA – and then one day, when she felt that her goals and the CIAs no longer aligned, she simply walked away.

  Not before leaving a backdoor to the CIA’s main server, which allows her unique access to one of the world’s greatest information gathering machines. She’d created a new name, passport and life for herself. From what Sam had told him, Elise was the new name she had chosen, and no one knew what her real name was.

  Even so, Tom stared at her, surprised.

  She was slightly shorter than the average American woman, but not by much more than a few inches. She wore cargo shorts and a white tank top, revealing toned and muscular arms. Tom’s first thought was that she probably did a lot of yoga in her spare time. Her ancestry was probably Eurasian. She had golden skin, light brown hair and a wondrous expression. Like life was all one big game, and she was the one with the most talent.

  “Welcome aboard the Maria Helena,” Sam said shaking her hand formally. “This is Matthew our skipper.”

  “Pleased to meet you,” she said shaking his hand.

  “And this is Tom. He’s our pilot and despite his size, he’s probably the best wreck diver in the world. You’ve already met Veyron, our engineer.”