Knight's Cross (The Shipwreck Adventures Book 3)

by Christine Kling

  She paused and looked at him. “What? You didn’t put the moves on me until much later, Mr. Thatcher.”

  “But that night, in the moonlight with the dolphins playing around the boat—that was the night I realized how beautiful you are, Magee.”

  She put one hand on a hip and cocked her head to the side as she looked him over. “I don’t believe we have time just now to properly reward that kind of talk, Captain Thatcher.”

  “Rain check, then. What do you say we drop this mooring and head on out to sea?”

  “Why, that’s a fabulous idea,” she said.

  They slipped their mooring and motored inside Bedir Island and around the flashing light on Ince Point before they turned on their running lights. They were in the shipping channel at that point, and running dark would have been foolish. They passed one little coastal freighter chugging into port and a big Turkish charter gulet playing loud music for the tourists dancing on deck. Then they were out of the narrow channel and out of Marmaris Bay.

  The wind was light out of the northwest, which put it directly behind them. But as they motored farther out offshore, the wind increased.

  “I think there’s enough wind to sail without the engine,” Riley said.

  Cole nodded. “It’s about seventy-five nautical miles until we make our turn. Straight ahead on a course of one twenty-five. Then another ten miles or so up into Kekova.”

  Riley unfurled the big genoa. Cole shut off the engine and set the autopilot. He checked the radar and set the alarm. He put the AIS in stealth mode. There wasn’t another boat within twenty miles of them. It was going to be a quiet night.

  “Ah, that’s better,” Riley said after she’d coiled the tail of the sheet to keep it off the cockpit cushion. She spread out on her back on the cushion and put her hands behind her head. “I needed this.”

  Cole loved that gurgling sound a boat made as it passed through the water just under hull speed. When she moved faster, it was more like a swoosh. But at this speed, it almost sounded like fingers softly playing the very high notes on a piano. Much as he loved his new boat, he would miss the sweet quiet of sailing.

  “I love my dodger,” Riley said, “but it does make it difficult to stargaze on nights like this. Look at all of them. Here we are on a sailboat traveling the same way the old Knights of Saint John did. In fact, when the Silver Girl sailed here with her Knight, they were probably looking up at the same stars. We’re all just tiny specks. Infinitely smaller than those specks in the sky.”

  Cole watched her and wondered how he could possibly do right by this woman. He wanted her by his side—more than anything. But if that were to cause her harm, he wouldn’t be able to live with himself.

  Riley’s phone pinged again. She sat up. “Okay, already. I’ll read your dang messages.” She pulled the phone out of her shorts pocket and slid her finger around the phone screen. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  “What?”

  “She says she’s going to fly to Turkey because she’s worried about me.”

  “How come?”

  “I haven’t been answering her texts or emails.” She looked at him and shook her head. “I’d say we’ve been rather busy.”

  Cole stepped around the wheel and sat next to her on the cockpit cushion. “She’s your mother. Of course she’ll worry.”

  “Cole, you don’t know my mother. She’s just worried the wedding might get called off. We go for six years only exchanging the occasional email, but as soon as I mention I’m getting married, she latches on to me, and we’re suddenly close as can be.”

  “She’s not the only one who worries about you.”

  “Oh please.”

  “Seriously, Riley. When you didn’t come back from the palace on the Via Condotti. When I saw Blondie drive you into that estate. I thought they were going to kill you.”

  “And you came for me.”

  He nodded. “When I suggested maybe we should wait on the wedding, it was because of how much I love you. Right now I would like more than anything to stop someplace, put you ashore, and send you back to Marmaris to meet your mother and take care of your family. We don’t know what we’re sailing into down there, and we don’t even have any weapons.” He leaned in closer to her. “Riley, I want you to let me finish this thing alone.”

  “Now that sounds crazy, Cole Thatcher.”

  “No, it’s not. When a man loves a woman, he feels this overpowering need to protect her. Can’t you understand that?”

  She didn’t answer right away. She rubbed her hand up his back and reached into his hair. He closed his eyes as her fingers ruffled his hair.

  “Sure. I understand. But I have overwhelming feelings, too. I’m a trained marine, Cole. And you might be surprised at what can be used as a weapon on this boat. I need you to trust and respect my strengths.”

  “Riley, it’s not that I don’t trust you.”

  She held her finger to his lips. “I know. We’re learning how to do this, how to be a couple. When do we disagree, when should we speak out. You wanted me to trust that you really saw a man I thought surely was dead. And now I want you to trust that we’re better together.”

  “I know that, Riley, but I’m afraid for you.”

  “Cole, I lived alone and sailed alone for years. I’m having to make huge adjustments to this new lifestyle. Selling Bonefish and moving on your boat does make sense, and I suppose I’ll get used to the idea eventually. But I’m still trying to find where I fit in your life.” She smiled then, and he caught a devilish glint in her eye. “I mean, to be clear, you’re the academic, and I’m the muscle.”

  “So you think you’re stronger than I am?”

  “Damn sure of it.”

  He narrowed his eyes and looked her up and down. “Have you ever wrestled?”

  “I can take down a two-hundred-and-fifty-pound marine in hand-to-hand combat. And you, what was it? Wrestled in high school?”

  “Them’s fighting words,” he said.

  “I’m counting on it.”

  He turned, pushed her shoulders back down onto the cockpit seat, straddled her waist, and pinned her to the cushion. “Something tells me that was too easy.”

  She laughed and grabbed the front of his shirt, pulling his face closer to hers. “I thought now might be a good time to let you cash in that rain check.”

  The Grand Hotel Excelsior Malta

  Valletta, Malta

  April 28, 2014

  Virgil sat at a window table in the hotel bar, overlooking the harbor and the city lights of Sliema. The young woman in the chair opposite him was drinking her third apple martini. Neither of them was interested in making small talk, so he had plenty of time to think about his situation.

  On the plus side, she was very young and her figure was magnificent, with the tiny waist and ample breasts, clearly enhanced by something other than nature. She was a blonde, as he had asked for, with hair cropped short just below her ears. But he was certain that the blonde hair was not natural. Like many Maltese women, her features showed the history of her island. Her almond-shaped eyes and long nose, though beautiful, demonstrated that the Arabs had been here the longest. She wore a small, tight-fitting black dress and spike heels, but he was finding it difficult to feel any interest. Maybe he really was getting old.

  His wife Shawny—now she had been a real blonde. Her family was from northern Europe, and the first day he had seen her he knew he had to have her. Bonnie had inherited her mother’s beauty. Someday, long after Operation Barnabas, he hoped his daughter would realize he’d done what he’d done to clean the world of filth so people like her could feel safe.

  The last forty-eight hours had been hectic and exhausting, but he was satisfied he’d done his duty. As he’d promised Signor Oscura, he had found Thatcher. Well, he knew where Thatcher was, and it would be only a matter of hours before he learned what the man knew.

  After he had lost them in Rome on Saturday, Virgil had returned to the Vatican Library and retrie
ved the book of maps. He took it back to the Via Condotti, scanned the pages, and sent them off to the Order’s friend at NSA. He came back with several possibilities. First, there was the castle drawing in the back of the book. Without more data on where to look, it would be difficult to track down which of the thousands of castles around the Mediterranean that one could be. There was a reference to a location on the coast of Tunisia near Sousse, and various navigational waypoints in the waters between Malta and what the map called the Barbary Coast, as well as northward to Sicily. There was also a reference to a section of the maps that was not covered. It seemed to point to something spelled with a double K that was off the page, but the operative said his computers brought back at least ten possible locations on and off the coast. He could not determine what the actual location was without more data. So Thatcher must have that data, Virgil thought.

  He’d wanted to leave for Malta immediately, on the assumption that Thatcher would return to his boat once he’d got the information he needed from the Vatican Library. Virgil had checked with the port captain and determined that the yacht was still in a marina there. However, there was no escaping his duties on Sunday. Every member of the Guardiani was required to attend the dual canonization mass for Pope John XXIII and Pope John Paul II, where the Knights of the Sovereign Order of Malta had better seats than many bishops. And well into the night, his duties were needed at the celebration afterward at the Villa del Priorato.

  He hadn’t been able to catch his flight to Malta until this morning. Upon arrival, he’d taken a cab from the airport directly to the Excelsior Hotel. When he had stepped out onto his balcony, he’d seen a big yacht powering away from the dock at the Manoel Island Yacht Marina. As the yacht turned into the channel, Virgil grabbed his small binoculars out of his kit bag. He read the name on the stern: Shadow Chaser II. The only person he saw out on deck was a black woman.

  He immediately called the port captain. His office affirmed that the four-person crew list for departure included Cole Thatcher and Marguerite Riley. Their next port of call was to be Palermo, Sicily. Virgil contemplated renting a speedboat to intercept the big yacht, but he decided that would be foolish. He checked the Shipfinder website, and the big yacht was broadcasting her location on AIS. How difficult would it be to track them?

  He called the Order’s travel agency and they booked him on an early-morning flight to Palermo. Sicily made lots of sense. The manuscript likely was hidden someplace close to Malta. In the meantime, he decided he had time to enjoy the five-star hotel they had booked for him in Valletta.

  The woman sitting across from him was staring at the TV over the bar. On the screen, two people were seated in chairs talking to one another. The volume was turned all the way down, but the subtitles were in Maltese.

  Virgil’s phone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out, tapped the screen, and held it to his ear.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi, uh, this is Colin. Is Diggory there?” The man’s voice had a British accent.

  Virgil was about to hang up when he thought better of it. “No, Dig isn’t available. Can I help you, Colin?”

  “Maybe. He gave me this as a second number to call. See, he asked me to keep a watch on the marina here in Marmaris for him. He wanted me to let him know if Cole Thatcher or his lady showed up around here. He said he’d pay me two hundred euros for a tip if they showed.”

  “Yes, sure, you did the right thing, Colin. Priest isn’t here right now, but I’m his boss. I’d be happy to pay you for any information you have.”

  “He would always send me the money through PayPal. Can you do that, too?”

  “Sure I can.”

  “Okay, I’ll give you my email address.”

  Virgil thought, he’s got to be kidding. He isn’t going to talk to me until he gets paid?

  “All right,” he said. “I’m listening.”

  A few minutes later, when Colin was able to verify that the payment had gone through, he said, “Okay, I was coming out of the shitter tonight here in the boatyard.”

  “Where is here? What boatyard?”

  “It’s the Adakoy Shipyard and Marina. Where they built their fancy new boat.”

  “I know the place.”

  “Anyway, I was coming out, and I saw Cole and Riley come through the gate. They asked me to give them a ride out to their boat.”

  “What boat is that?”

  “Her boat. A forty-foot sailboat called the Bonefish. They asked me for a ride in my dinghy, and when I dropped them off, I asked them if they were going out for a sail. They said no, they were just going to move the boat into a marina off town. I stayed up and watched when they left. They didn’t turn on their running lights, which was odd. But through my binoculars, I could still track their boat. They didn’t go to town. They turned out to sea.”

  “Thank you for calling, Colin. You did the right thing.”

  After Colin hung up, Virgil dialed a familiar number. “I need some local talent,” he said into the phone. “I’m in Malta, and I need someone with access to satellite imaging.” The man on the other end of the line asked him his location, then told him to hold. When he came back on, he said his talent would be arriving in thirty minutes.

  When the line disconnected, Virgil set his phone on the table.

  The girl across from him pulled her eyes away from the TV screen. “Do you want to go up to your room?” she asked.

  He shook his head, then reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. He took out several hundred-euro bills and handed them to her. “Something has come up. I’ve got to go. Take this for your time.”

  She grabbed at the bills before he was finished speaking.

  “Thank you,” he said. He wasn’t sure what he was thanking her for.

  She didn’t answer. She left the bar, teetering on the high heels without looking back.

  Virgil picked up his phone and checked his email again. There in his inbox were the three bounced emails that had come back when he had tried to contact Bonnie the last couple of days. Her account also had been deleted from Skype, and a search for “Bonnie Vandervoort” on Facebook revealed only a forty-year-old woman who lived in West Virginia.

  The talent showed up right on time. Virgil recognized the young man immediately, though he had never met him. He wore an olive-drab army jacket over a faded T-shirt that read, “1984 was not supposed to be an instruction manual.” His jeans hung low on his slender waist, and the backs of their cuffs were frayed where he walked on them.

  The young man held out his hand. “Hey, you can call me Viper.” The accent sounded Eastern European, maybe Czech.

  “I’m Virgil. Take a seat.”

  It took only a few minutes for Virgil to explain what he needed.

  “Hacking into reconnaissance satellites is tricky business. They’re the only ones that can track night shots.”

  “I don’t need to know anything about how you do it. I just need results.”

  “Right. Don’t worry. I like working for your people. When I need permission or a password, it’s usually only a phone call away. Best of all, they pay well.”

  Virgil slid him his card across the table. “My email address is on here as well as my cell phone. As soon as you can tell me which direction they are headed, contact me. If I don’t answer the phone, send me an email or text. I need to know where they’re going and when and where they stop.”

  The young man stood up. “It’s a pleasure doing business with you. Expect something in two to three hours.”

  After he left, Virgil ordered another beer.

  When all this was over, maybe he’d hire Viper on his own. Ask him to find Bonnie. Then he’d wait and watch. He’d always been good at waiting. In a couple of years, when Bonnie was on her own, he’d see to Shawny. He could make it look like an accident.

  When his beer arrived, he dialed the travel-service number once more.

  “I need to change my flight tomorrow morning,” he said after he had ide
ntified himself. “Yes, I want the fastest routing you can find to get me to Marmaris, Turkey. ASAP.”

  Aboard Bonefish

  Kekova Roads, Turkey

  April 29, 2014

  The wind had increased a few hours after daybreak, as Bonefish was approaching the Greek isle of Kastellorizo and the sailboat’s speed topped eight knots. Riley was having a blast “pulling the strings,” as she called it—tweaking the sheets and playing the vang and outhaul, all the while watching the knot meter to see if she could boost her boat’s speed by a quarter of a knot or more. The wind had developed a more northerly edge, and that put it more off the boat’s quarter. A broad reach was her boat’s favorite point of sail.

  Ahead, Riley saw another sailboat come out through the opening to Kekova Roads. It was a fiberglass boat about the same size as hers, probably a bareboat charter. The other boat put its nose into the wind with the mainsail flapping and powered straight upwind. It rose up on the little swells kicked up by the wind and then slammed into the next swell. The people in the cockpit were all bundled up in foul-weather gear when they motored past. Riley figured they were cursing at her, sitting out in the sun in her shorts and T-shirt, having a fantastic sail.

  “How’s it going out there, Captain?” Cole called from the settee berth in the main salon, where he was napping.

  “It’s glorious, and we’re about to enter the channel into Kekova Roads. We’ll be able to see the castle shortly.”

  Cole climbed up the companionway, sat next to her on the port seat, and wrapped his arms around her. He lifted her hair and kissed the side of her neck. “You’re right. It is glorious out here.”

  Tingles ran down her back as the hairs on her arms lifted in gooseflesh. “I was talking about the sailing and the view.”

  “And I was just agreeing. From where I’m sitting, the view is spectacular.”

  Riley stood up. “Cole, it’s one thing to ‘knock boots,’ as Theo says, out in the open ocean, but right now we have to turn upwind to make it through this channel.”