The waterway was a quarter mile wide and split down the middle by a dock that stretched a mile into the sea. Monster-sized ships lined up on either side of the dock like the inverted teeth of a zipper. Next to them, the harbor vessels looked like water bugs. All these diesel engines meant fumes, and fumes meant hateful odors. My nose curled. Behind and above it all, the refinery loomed, the dark backdrop to the drama playing out in front of us.
Who was I kidding? As close as we were now, it was no longer in front of us—we were onstage.
I had just started the Lord’s Prayer again when Nick yelled, “FBI on the dock! Sirens, lights, agents everywhere.”
Yes! Let them handle it.
I had no view of the action, but I imagined agents yelling, doors slamming, sirens screaming. Kate’s engine and the rush of water blocked out the sounds, but in my head, it was like listening to “Ave Maria,” a song so beautiful it made me want to weep.
Nick relayed an update. “Looks like they’ve already cuffed a few people and are putting them in cars.”
I pictured an FBI agent in a blue windbreaker with big yellow letters, his hand on a suspect’s head as he pushed him into the backseat of a black Ford Explorer like the ones I’d seen local agents driving around the island.
Bill eased off the throttle and we coasted up the mouth of the harbor closer to the melee. I could hear the sirens now, too. OK, let’s go now. Turn the boat around. The good guys are winning.
“Are we done here, fellas?” I shouted.
No answer.
I stood up and looked out the back of the cabin. How odd. A little boat was cruising around one of the tankers. It didn’t look like FBI to me.
I clicked the talk button on my radio. “I see something. Back out toward the mouth of the harbor. There’s a little inflatable by the last ship.”
What I didn’t see anymore was the cigarette boat. Had it kept going? Maybe I had succumbed to hysterical paranoia, if there was such a thing.
Seconds ticked by.
“I see them!” Nick yelled.
And then Collin was shouting into his radio from his post at the stern. “The FBI missed some of the bad guys. They’re in a little inflatable with a big motor.”
“Copy that,” Kurt said into his radio.
“I’m on it,” came from Bill.
The tiny, low-profile boat was slinking from tanker to tanker, shielded from the eyes of the FBI agents above by the looming ships. And then they pulled close to the side of a ship and stopped, and a man stood up and leaned toward it. I was trying to figure out what he was doing when Bill’s voice boomed out from the flybridge.
“Well, what do you know. Looks like they got them a getaway vehicle, out by the little island past the mouth of the harbor.”
I swung my head and binoculars around for a look. The boat Bill saw was all the way out of the harbor, but trolling, almost like it was whistling with its hands behind its back looking skyward. “Who, me?” it seemed to ask. It was the cigarette boat I’d seen earlier.
Collin’s voice crackled over the radio. “Oh crap, they’re planting explosives on the hull of the tanker. We’ve got to stop them. Swing her around, Bill.”
Once again, I spun around to see, but we were already too late. The man who had stood up seconds ago—planting a bomb?—sat back down, and the boat shot up the waterway.
Chapter Thirty
Bill spun Kate 180 degrees and pushed her throttles forward. She responded, but at the lumbering rate of a sixty-foot yacht. When the inflatable’s driver caught sight of us, he hit the gas, too. Kate strained to increase speed but the nimble inflatable outpaced her.
From my handgrip on the back of the cabin, port side, I could see three men. We weren’t close enough for me to see their faces, but through my binoculars, two looked Latino and the other appeared local. That surprised me, although it shouldn’t have. Lord knows they’d hired local every step of the way.
Kate roared up the harbor. She had planed out and her body rode high above the water. We had the intercept angle on the inflatable as they raced for the mouth of the harbor. As we got closer, Kate’s bow started to shimmy slightly in their wake. I slipped back into the cabin and stood on the white leather couch with my nose against the glass. I would apologize to the owner if I ever met him for putting my dirty feet on his upholstery.
Collin moved around from the stern to the walkway behind Kurt, both of them inches away from me on the other side of the window. His voice through my radio was muffled by the wind as we flew toward the terrorists. “Bill, bring us in for a shot from the side. Nick, be ready in case they make a tricky move. Kurt and I will unload as we get closer.”
Unload?
“Ten-four, good buddy,” Bill said. Bill was having way too much fun with this.
I crept out of the galley again and peered around the side to see what Collin and Kurt were doing. We bore down on the little boat, but the occupants were ready. Two muzzles appeared above the sides of the boat, aimed back at Kate.
“Guns, they’re pointing guns at us!” I shrieked. I bounded back into the cabin and flattened myself on the sofa as shots rang out and bullets slammed into Kate’s hull. My three favorite men hit the deck almost simultaneously. But Kate lurched to port and lost speed as she made a crazy left-hand turn, digging deep into the water.
“Bill, what the heck’s going on up there?” Collin yelled over the radio.
I sprinted for the stairs. Something was very wrong. I took them two at a time and bounded over the top and onto the bridge. Bill lay on his side clutching his thigh. Blood seeped through his shorts and down his leg. Thank God, it’s only his leg.
“Are you all right?” I crouched beside him.
“Grab the wheel, Katie. I’m shot, but I’m fine. Grab the wheel,” he yelled.
I leapt up and put both hands on the helm.
“Straighten us out and put us back on course. You be my eyes and hands. I’ll tell you what to do,” Bill said in a voice that sounded much calmer than I felt.
“These black knobs on the right are the throttles, correct?”
“You got it.”
I didn’t stop to think. I turned the wheel until I had Kate pointed back toward the inflatable. Kate struggled to get higher in the water.
Collin’s voice came through clearly on our radios. “What the hell happened, Bill? Make sure you’re aiming for intercept, now, not catch-up, and don’t back off the throttles. Nick, stay low and come around to our side at the stern. We can’t shoot until we’re right on them. You guys aim for the side of the boat. I’m shooting to disable the driver. Let’s put a few spears in that spare tire with a motor.”
There was no time to tell them I was captain now. I pushed the throttles all the way forward and aimed in front of the inflatable at an angle. I had done this before in vehicles. Land vehicles. But not at top speed, and not in a boat.
Bill dragged himself up on the settee so he could see where we were going. Red blood all over white cushions. Not good.
More shots rang out. Our guys stayed low. I tried to look invisible and wished I could lie down on the floor, but I held steady.
We barreled even closer. The men stayed down.
More shots.
Closer.
More.
Closer still.
“Now,” Collin cried, and one shotgun and two spear guns shifted over Kate’s side below me and released in the direction of the inflatable. Collin’s gun blast blocked out every other sound, and he pulled the barrel back, cha-chook, and shot again and again. Seconds later, three men disappeared, and I hoped they had dived into the cabin.
More shots rang out and thudded into the hull. The damage to Kate was going to cost us a fortune if we lived to pay for it. I had the sensation of bees swarming the bridge and I realized it was the sound of bullets whizzing past me.
“Get down, Bill,” I screamed.
All this—but had we hit the inflatable? The suspense plugged my lungs with cement at the s
ame time as it poured accelerant into my heart. But then I saw it, and I jumped into the air and yelped.
I pulled the throttles back and keyed the radio. “You got it! The inflatable is collapsing on one side.” I thought for a moment, then spoke into it again. “Um, also, Bill is shot in the thigh.”
I heard Collin pumping his shotgun, and then a boom.
“Don’t let them get away, Bill!” Nick screamed into the radio.
Either he hadn’t heard me or he thought Bill was Superman. I looked into the distance and saw the cigarette boat fleeing. I rammed the throttles forward on Kate, ignoring Bill’s groans about her engines. Kate came to speed and shot out of the harbor after the getaway boat.
Nick and Kurt stood together on the port side, spear guns reloaded and aimed. Collin was one step in front of them, pumping and firing, but the boat was pulling away. Again, I aimed in front of them for an interception, but we made up no ground.
And then the U.S. Coast Guard arrived, appearing suddenly because the island had blocked sight of its approach, and we erupted in a cheer. Their cutter intercepted the cartel boat from the front while I closed in on it from behind and it dropped speed. There was no escape. A barrier island hemmed it in on the right, and an exposed reef crowded it from the left. The terrorists lifted their hands in the air in surrender, weapons pointed down. Another Coast Guard cutter arrived and replaced us on point.
I pulled back on the throttles and Kate hummed her way to coasting speed.
“Turn her around, Bill, and let’s make sure the inflatable stayed put,” Collin ordered.
I spun Kate around, back toward the inflatable, which was now half submerged. I brought her to trolling speed and stationed her between it and the other apprehended vessel.
Just then a third and a fourth Coast Guard boat appeared.
Bill said, “Hand me the radio, Katie,” and I passed it over.
He said, “Attention, all passengers. The Coasties are pulling into the harbor, and they have their guns sighted on the bad guys and us. Put away the weapons, everyone, and adjust your halos.”
Now that her engine was quieter, we could hear the Coast Guard over their loud speakers. One of the boats had pulled alongside the inflatable, and the other by us.
“Cut your engines and drop your weapons immediately. Prepare to be boarded. This is the U.S. Coast Guard.”
Three heads appeared at the top of the steps, one after another, as Kurt, Nick, and Collin joined us on the bridge.
“Bill!” Kurt said.
“They got me in the leg. I’m fine,” Bill said. He had tied his shirt around his thigh and was pressing the cloth into his leg. Most of the bleeding had stopped. “Well, it hurts like hell, but I’ll live.”
“So who drove the boat?” Kurt asked.
Bill pointed at me. Now that the action was over, I was trembling, but I gripped the helm behind my back to hide it.
“You drove the boat?” Nick said. But he was grinning at me, a lot of white teeth against his sunburned skin.
“What? You think I can’t drive a boat? Or investigate a death case? Or find a lost husband?” I asked, smiling, too.
“Don’t burst his bubble, Katie,” Collin said.
“You’re amazing,” Nick said. “Badass, Katie.”
“I’ll bet you never fire me from another case, Nick Kovacs,” I said.
“Scout’s honor, I won’t,” he said.
“Is everyone else all right?” I asked the other three men.
“I’m pretty sure Nick peed himself, but other than that we’re good,” Collin said.
“That coming from the pro whose shot missed by a mile. Luckily I came over to your side and saved the day,” Nick said. “You’re welcome.”
“You both missed. That’s my spear in the side of that boat. Wisdom and experience beat youthful bravado every time,” Kurt said.
They appeared to be completely fine.
“Is it safe to leave the bridge?” I asked.
“Yeah, somebody needs to make me a drink,” Bill said.
“Hang tight a little longer,” Collin said.
I moved over to Nick, who took my hand. I felt his heart beating in his fingers. His pupils were still dilated and looking for the enemy. Seconds stretched into minutes until a shout came from over the side. Kate rocked as a smaller Coast Guard craft bumped us. “Everyone OK here?”
Five voices called, “Yes, sir.”
“We need to come aboard and confirm the absence of unfriendlies. Is that all right, Captain?”
Kurt restrained himself and Bill said, “Yes sir, and welcome aboard.”
The Coastie threw a line and Kurt went down to secure their vessel. The rest of us went down the steps, Collin helping Bill, and stationed ourselves outside the cabin door, clear of where the Coasties would board. A younger man and his heavier partner climbed over a few seconds later.
“Good morning, gentlemen,” the heavier one said, and then saw me. “And ma’am.”
I ducked my head in acknowledgment as the guys all said, “Morning, sir.”
He spoke again, to Kurt. “Permission to search your vessel, Captain.”
Kurt gestured toward Bill, and Bill pointed at me. I curtsied, and the guys all laughed. The Coasties registered mild surprise. Bill grinned and lifted the arm he’d been using to apply pressure to his wound with a beach towel. He waved it and the bloody towel at our visitors. “Be our guest.”
Again, surprise. “You’re injured, sir?”
Bill relished the moment. “Just a flesh wound. I’m fine.” He’d take a thousand bullets to live a day like this one.
The Coasties commenced their duties. When they returned, the younger one said, “Nice boat. Commodore Ralph Tate called ahead to let us know to expect you. Thanks for hobbling the terrorists until we could get here.”
“No problem,” Kurt said.
The jauntily uniformed Coasties shook hands all around. “We’ll need statements later.”
We gave them our contact information and agreed to meet them at three p.m. at the FBI offices in the Federal Building in town.
The heavier one spoke again. “You guys are free to go for now. I understand one of you has had a long week?”
Nick raised his hand. After a beat, Kurt and I raised ours, too. The Coasties both laughed as they went back over the side to their boat.
Kurt turned to Bill and said, “Captain, if you would please allow me the honor of fetching you that drink.”
Bill saluted Kurt.
I moved to the side walkway for a better view of the real action. The bad guys in the inflatable had their hands up. Their boat listed badly but was still floating, one side of it limp and sinking. I turned to rejoin the others.
Wait a second.
I walked to the bow and lifted the binocs to my eyes again. What the hell? Detective Tutein was in that boat. In profile, but clearly recognizable. What was he doing here with the Feds?
I looked closer.
His wrists were behind his back in silver bracelets. Was Detective Tutein the local I had seen in the boat with the two Mexicans?
Impossible.
I counted heads in the boat. Three men. Two Mexicans. One local. The same as during the chase. And the only local in the boat—a local wearing handcuffs—was Detective Tutein.
I punched the talk button on my radio. “Nick, do you see who that is in the terrorists’ boat?”
Nick came up beside me to take a look. I felt his large, warm hand on my shoulder, moist breath on my neck, and his binoculars protruding past my face.
“Holy Mother Goose and Grimm. It’s Tutein. It is, isn’t it?” he asked, as incredulous as me.
I smiled. “Yes, it is Tu-friggin-tein. And you without your spear gun.”
Chapter Thirty-one
Returning home felt like a huge gulp of fresh cool air. We pulled into our driveway at lunchtime or thereabouts with Bill, who’d refused medical treatment, telling Nick he’d “be fine if you’ll just let your goo
d-looking wife clean it and stick a bandage on it,” referring to the wound on his upper thigh.
To my chagrin, Nick had cheerfully agreed.
“You live here? This is your house?” Bill asked.
Annalise always shined brightest for visitors. Her yellow stucco dazzled the eye and bright bougainvillea reached up to her as if she were the sun. She glowed like Monet’s “Woman with a Parasol.”
Hello, old friend.
“We live here, but we’ve come to realize we belong to the house more than she belongs to us,” I said.
“Huh?”
“Long story,” I said.
“Does this have anything to do with your wife hearing voices?” Bill asked Nick.
Nick slapped him on the shoulder and said, “That’s not even the half of it.”
Five dogs circled our parked car, yelping, barking, and growling. Oso defied certain punishment and put his front paws on the door to stick his long nose through the open window. This started a trend, and soon six paws were on the door and three noses in the car. Bill shrank back. Oso grinned, showing his teeth and dripping drool onto Bill’s lap.
“Are the dogs vicious?” he asked.
“Not if you feed them raw meat. You brought some, didn’t you?” Nick said.
Everyone laughed except Bill.
We’d been trying to call Julie ever since we made it off the boat, but all we got was voicemail. Her car wasn’t home, either. Ruth was here, though, and she ran out to greet us. I had only seen Ruth run once before, and that time she had thought Taylor was drowning in the pool. Which he kind of was, but not really, because Annalise had saved him. Ruth ran straight for Nick today.
He opened his arms wide. She hugged him and wailed like a baby.
“Don’t you ever go scaring us like that again, Nick Kovacs, or I whup you, and whup you good. Shame on you,” she said when she had calmed down enough to speak.
Nick laid his head on hers and then lifted her up and twirled her around.
She squealed. “Put me down. I too old for nonsense, put me down.” She swatted him and he set her down, but she held on for a little while longer anyway.
Finding Harmony (Katie & Annalise Book 3) Page 24