Antonio looked at her. “Jeez . . . Not only is she cute, but she’s smart and knows international politics. Why’d you have to marry him?”
“He made it unbearable. It was the only way he’d leave me alone.”
“Anyway,” Antonio said, “life is unfair. And changing the subject, what brings you to Barcelona?”
“Business, as usual,” Riley said with a shrug. “We’re transporting a load of textile machinery from Italy that I hope to get rid of by tomorrow.”
“And anything else? Something that might . . . interest me?”
Riley opened a duffel bag he’d brought from the ship and pushed it over to Antonio with his foot. Antonio studied its contents carefully. “Good quality.”
“The best, as usual. French champagne, Swiss chocolate, and American tobacco.”
“How much do you have?”
“In total? Thirty-two crates.”
Antonio whistled in amazement. “That’s a bit much for me, for almost anyone.”
“You don’t have to take it all. We can look for more buyers.”
“That’s not a good idea,” he said, shaking his head. “They’ve been cracking down on the black market lately, and if you start to move a lot of merchandise, someone’ll snitch. No, you need one buyer, then forget about it.”
Riley leaned forward across the table smeared with wine and bread crumbs. “But you just finished saying it’s too much merchandise for anyone.”
“Well, I have some contacts . . .” Antonio said, looking in the bag again. “If you give me a good price, I can handle the distribution of all the cargo.”
“A good price?”
“Ten percent of the profits.”
“Two,” Riley responded. “And my sincerest thanks.”
“Eight,” Antonio said. “I have a wife and kids to feed.”
“Four percent is my final offer, and you’re too ugly to have a wife, much less one who’d have kids with you.”
“Don’t be silly,” Julie said. “Five percent would be fair. C’est bien, Antonio?”
“What else can I do?” he said, shrugging.
“Deal,” Riley said, sealing it with a handshake. “Tomorrow send some guys and a truck to Moll Nou, and I’ll take care of customs.”
“All right, you’ll have them by the afternoon.”
“By the way, Antonio, do you know anyone else who might be interested in our services?”
“Now that you mention it,” he said, stroking his mustache, “I know of someone who’s looking for people to do a special job.”
“Who?” Jack asked.
“All I know is they need to salvage something quickly from a sunken ship. You guys have done that before, right?”
“Once,” Riley said, “but it was expensive and dangerous. It’s almost never worth it.”
“Well, this time I’d say it would be.” Antonio lowered his voice to a whisper. “I heard there’s an obscene amount of money involved.”
“I like obscenity,” Riley said, smiling.
“Who’s the contractor?” Jack said.
“A financier who happens to be in Barcelona these days. I can arrange a meeting for you tomorrow morning.”
“Does he have a name?” Jack asked.
Antonio clasped his hands and looked down, suddenly quiet.
“Antonio?” Riley asked.
“He’s Majorcan . . .” Antonio said. “I think you know who I’m talking about.”
They were all silent for a moment as they tried to decipher the cryptic response. At almost exactly the same time, they all figured it out.
“Oh no!” Julie shouted, causing everyone in the bar to look at her. “That, no! Never!”
“Never again!” César said. “Captain, you said never again!”
“Don’t even mention that ass!” Jack yelled, raising a threatening finger at Riley. “Don’t even think about it! You hear me? I’d rather die than work for him again!”
5
Back on the Pingarrón, the crew congregated around the dining room table, the atmosphere tense.
“It’d just be a job like any other,” Riley said. “We’ll find out what it is, decide if it interests us, and if not, adios.”
“We can’t just say adios to that guy. He’ll try to cheat us, rob us, or kill us . . . and probably all three at the same time,” Marco said.
“It won’t be like that this time. Now we’re on guard, so we’ll be ready. Everything’ll be fine.”
“You gave us your word,” Julie said, pointing at him. “You said we’d never work for him again.”
“I know, but we need the money, and we can’t afford to refuse a job just because we don’t like who’s paying us.”
Julie spread her palms. “Don’t like him? Mon Dieu! He wanted to kill us!”
“We know you’re the captain, but we’re the majority,” César said. “None of us will work for that man, it doesn’t matter how much money he offers.”
“Mr. Moreira,” Riley said seriously, “this is my ship, and it isn’t a democracy.”
“I know, Captain, but you can’t run a ship by yourself. You need us, and we don’t want to accept the job.”
“I didn’t say we were going to take it, but it wouldn’t hurt to find out what it is, right?”
“I think it will,” Julie argued. “Tomorrow we’ll already have unloaded all the merchandise, and we can go to any other port, maybe Valencia, or if not to—”
“Julie,” Riley said. “We lose money every day with an empty hold, and I don’t need to remind you how expensive this business is. The mooring, the fuel, the maintenance . . . We have to work constantly to come out ahead.”
“That guy’s a scoundrel. We’ll regret it for the rest of our short lives,” Jack said.
“Who’s a scoundrel?” Elsa called from the doorway.
“He-hello, Mrs. Rubinstein,” Jack said. “No one, it’s no one . . . We’re talking about a bad man.”
Riley explained, “It’s an individual who’d make us a good deal, but unfortunately my crew’s terrified and refuses to work with him.”
“Oh yeah?” Elsa said, tilting her head.
“Well.” Jack coughed. “‘Terrified’ isn’t the best word, it’d be better to say—”
“Are you afraid of him?” she asked. She wore a revealing dress, and as she came closer to the table she smelled of perfume. She sat between Marco and Jack and put a hand on each of their shoulders. “Does this demon that terrifies seasoned sailors have a name?”
“His name’s Juan March, and he’s practically an old man,” Riley said.
“You don’t say? What a surprise,” she whispered. “I thought smugglers were brave, tough men.”
Jack and Marco turned red.
“I thought so too,” Riley said with a shrug. “But as you can see—”
“One moment, Captain. I didn’t say no,” Marco said, cracking his knuckles. “When—when do you want us to go talk to him?”
Elsa put her arm around Marco’s shoulders and gave him a flirtatious smile that almost made him melt.
“I think the earlier the better,” Jack said, trying to regain the initiative. “We should try to meet with him tomorrow. And I think I should go alone so no one else has to risk their life.”
Riley tried not to laugh as he rested his elbows on the table. “So . . . that means you’re with me on this?”
“Absolutely.”
“Why wouldn’t I be?” Marco chimed in.
“Wonderful, I knew I could count on you.” Riley winked at César and Julie, who had been watching the scene in disbelief. “Look at that, now we’re the majority.” Then he stood up, grabbed a bottle of wine from the stash, and headed for the stairs to the lower deck and his cabin. “It’s late, so we’ll discuss the details tomorrow. Good night, everyone.”
Still grinning like a fox, he knocked on the door of the passenger cabin. “Mr. Rubinstein?”
The door opened, and Rubinstein appeared in flannel paja
mas, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “Yes?”
“Mr. Rubinstein, I just wanted to thank you for the favor.” He handed him the bottle of wine. “Tell your wife our little comedy was a success, and if she’d dedicated herself to it, she would’ve been a great actress.”
At dawn a light rain lazily sprinkled the city streets. Usually, those dreary days that called for a hot coffee with a dash of rum were Riley’s favorite. The moisture sharpened the pain of his old gunshot wound—a reminder of everything he could not, should not, and did not want to forget.
On days like those, Riley was used to reveling in the silent melancholy that had been with him for years. He liked to sit on the bridge deck, listening to the hypnotic drumming of the raindrops and savoring the sweet poison of memory. He’d contemplate the gray horizon blurring heaven and earth and watch the world reveal itself as a gloomy, indifferent place, knowing with bitter certainty it was how things really were. He’d feel almost at peace with himself.
But that was not the case this morning.
Instead, he and Jack went through the Barcelona fishing district on their way to the appointment with March. The streets there were more spacious and orderly than in the old town. Despite the gray sky overhead, the colors of the fishermen’s houses, the omnipresent geraniums decorating balconies and windows, and even the people taking cover in entrances made for a noticeably more cheerful atmosphere.
“I still think it’s a bad idea,” Jack mumbled, expecting an ambush at every corner. “That bastard’ll end up screwing us for sure.”
Riley gave a half smile. “You seemed pretty enthusiastic last night.”
“Go to hell. You think I don’t know what you did?”
“Who? Me? As I recall, you made your choice freely.”
“Damn freely. But what gets me,” Jack said, “is having fallen for it like an idiot. You took advantage of my . . . my feelings for that woman and Marco thinking with his balls.”
“Don’t worry. It’ll all work out.” Riley patted him on the back.
“Sure, that’s what Hitler said to the Poles.”
Two minutes later they arrived in the plaza, just across from the facade of Iglesia de Sant Miquel del Port. Two thugs in trench coats and hats, indifferent to the rain, turned toward them.
“Last chance,” Jack said as the men opened the door of a black Mercedes in sinister invitation.
“We’re at the bridge,” Riley said, feeling the comforting weight of his Colt under his jacket. “All we have to do is cross it.”
Ignoring their protests, the men blindfolded them when they got in.
The car circled around Barcelona for almost an hour, which Riley figured was meant to make them lose their sense of direction. Since it wasn’t a very large city, with hardly any traffic lights, they could have covered it from top to bottom twice in that time. They finally stopped abruptly with a screech. The men warned them not to remove their blindfolds and led them inside.
“You can take them off now,” a hoarse voice behind them said.
When they did, they found themselves in a giant, opulent office. A large window overlooked a lush garden, and natural light shone on a big mahogany desk with two empty chairs that seemed to be waiting for them. A dozen paintings hung on the cream-colored walls. Riley was no expert, but he easily recognized Monet, van Gogh, and a couple of Greek or Roman sculptures, and had no doubt they were all authentic.
He was looking around, trying not to seem too impressed, when one of the thugs came up and frisked them fast. Before they knew it, their pistols were gone.
“Don’t worry,” the man said with a smile. “I’ll give them back to you when you leave.”
He signaled, and a skinny, large-nosed man came in through a side door. He was about five feet six and wore a nondescript dark suit, striped tie, and white shirt. He had a light step, despite looking like he was in his late fifties, and took a seat in a soft leather chair behind the desk. He gestured at the bodyguards, who nudged Riley and Jack into their seats.
The silence stretched on as March looked through some documents on his desk, ignoring them as if they weren’t there. It was hard to believe this guy who looked like an accountant was one of the most powerful men in Europe. Some called him “Franco’s banker,” and a good part of his fortune had come from smuggling, usury, and speculation.
Almost no one knew his origins, or how he’d gotten big enough to make Al Capone look like a neighborhood bully. Still, everyone knew of his serious influence in the Spanish government, contracts to supply petroleum to the Nazis, double game with the Allies, and constant betrayals. He was someone to be dealt with very carefully; with a word he could send you to the bottom of the harbor in beautiful cement shoes.
“They’ve told me,” March said in a raspy voice, putting the papers he was reading off to the side, “that you already worked for me on one occasion.” He took off his reading glasses and looked at them for the first time.
Riley and Jack instinctively glanced at each other. They’d been hoping not to have to bring that up. “Some months ago,” Riley said, “you contracted us through a third party to do . . . transportation.”
“Oh yes?” March said, frowning. “I don’t remember. Did everything go well?”
Riley was about to lie and say yes, but then he saw a flash of cunning in March’s little eyes. “I believe you ordered our deaths,” he said, trying to sound indifferent.
“Oh yes, now I remember. It was because you were late in making the delivery, am I wrong?”
“At the time, I told your contact that our engine had broken and we needed to anchor in Oran to repair it. It wasn’t our fault, but he tried to sink my ship and kill me.”
March acted like he was being forced to repeat a lesson to a naughty child. “Captain Riley, put yourself in my place. Do you think I got to where I am by accepting excuses? In this business, reputation comes first, and if someone fails me or tries to cheat me . . . Well, you know what happens.”
“I never tried to cheat you,” Riley said.
“I know,” March said coldly. “If that had been the case, I assure you, you and your crew would be at the bottom of the sea. But let’s leave this unpleasant conversation aside.” He waved as if he were shooing a fly. “They’ve informed me you have some experience salvaging shipwrecks. Is that true?”
Riley gulped, knowing every word could be used against him later. “Last year we recovered a load of copper from a freighter that sank off the coast of Egypt.”
March nodded, apparently satisfied. “My collaborators have told me it’s a complicated process, that it needs specialized equipment and well-trained men.” He looked at Jack’s belly.
Jack got the hint and almost said something, but Riley kicked him while saying, “I have the best men and the best equipment. But it all depends on the depth of the wreck, the condition it’s in, and what you want to salvage.”
“Unfortunately,” March said, bringing his fingertips together, “I can’t comment with certainty on the first point, although it’s possibly less than one hundred fifty feet deep. Can you go one hundred fifty feet?”
“We can. And the rest?”
“We also don’t know the condition it’s in, but we think it’s not in too bad of shape, since it’s only been a few days since it sank.”
“Do you know how?”
“Of course,” he said with a grin. “But even so, I can’t tell you, nor can I tell you where it is, or what it is I need to salvage. Those are details you won’t know until you need to, and if I decide to contract you, of course.”
“I see.” Riley ran his hand over the scar on his cheek, doubting his decision to come. “And what guarantee do I have that you won’t try to kill us again?”
“Guarantee?” March looked at one of his bodyguards. “Did you hear that? They’re asking me for guarantees. This guy thinks he’s buying a car.” The henchman let out a laugh, which was cut short when March raised a finger. “Look, Mr. Riley,” he said. “Reputation
works both ways. Do your job well, and you’ll be compensated on time. Do it poorly, and you’ll be eaten by fish. That’s my guarantee.”
Jack broke his silence to whisper in Riley’s ear, “This guy’s gonna screw us.”
“You’re not making this easy, Mr. March,” Riley said, motioning for Jack to be quiet. “How much money are we talking about?”
March bent over his desk, his eyes penetrating theirs. “I never said it would be easy, but I assure you the reward will be worth the trouble. The real question is, can you do it or not?”
6
“You did what?” Julie asked, wide-eyed.
Riley looked at the lounge’s ceiling. “Let’s see.” He exhaled hard. “I’ll explain it to you a second time. During the meeting with Juan March, we decided—”
“We?” Jack said.
“Okay, I decided to accept the job. We have two days to arrive in Tangier, and once there, they’ll give us the exact location of a sunken ship nearby. From that point we have to find it, then retrieve a load yet to be specified. We have to deliver it to Juan March in person, at a time not yet specified, within a maximum of two weeks from today.”
“Only twelve days to find a wreck and salvage it? Are you crazy?” César said.
Marco shook his head. “Leave me on land. I don’t want anything to do with this.”
Riley closed his eyes and gave the crew a minute to get their concerns off their chests, then raised his hands in a bid for calm. “I understand you have doubts—”
“Doubts?” César said. “Actually, there are no doubts.”
“Please, listen to me.”
“Capitaine,” Julie said, “that man is a killer. I don’t want to work with him again.”
“I don’t want to either, but this is a good opportunity for everyone, and if we do a good job, we have a lot to gain.”
“I don’t see anything to gain by being dead,” Marco said.
Riley got up from his chair and leaned on the table, lowering his head. “Okay, I give up. I thought I could convince you, but I see it’s not the case. Anyway . . . it’s a shame.” He walked toward the door and looked at Jack. “Can you imagine what we could’ve done with a million dollars, my friend?”
Captain Riley (The Captain Riley Adventures Book 1) Page 5