by Chris Howard
“It’s good to see a civilized face on the waves.” Wilraven said it, but didn’t realize until he had all the words out that it was one of Adam DuFour’s greetings.
Drino clearly noticed the shift in Wilraven’s expression, and gave him a serious look.
“Something troubling you? How are you doing . . . ” He looked down at the cast. “Other than this?”
The captain cleared his throat to recover from a new flood of thoughts about DuFour, pushing a reluctant smile onto his face. “I’m well. How’s the sea been? How’s the Inés Errantes?”
Drino stepped back, gesturing over his shoulder, grinning now. “Continues to float, my friend. Home now to two hundred and forty-six.” He winked. “We had three newborns in the last two weeks. Strong. Good seagoing folk. Keeping the doc busy.” He glanced beyond Wilraven, lowering his voice. “Who are those guys?”
Drino was sharp as a damn needle.
Wilraven didn’t turn all the way around, just halfway to give the appearance of curiosity. He knew who Drino was talking about. There was no mystery in it. What did surprise the captain was Royce Cordell, Mr. Never-helpful, returning a steady, watchful gaze as if waiting to hear how he was going to answer Drino’s question.
Royce the spy.
The world seemed to stop on that instant, his brain working details like when did Royce join the crew? Was he working for Levesgue? Did the mercenary turn Royce, and if so, who else on his crew was secretly working against him? How could he discover their number? Some sort of test that might draw them out and expose them?
He was already plotting to feed Levesgue some disinformation and see how it came back to him. Then he’d know who had squealed to the—
Drino elbowed him. “Hey.”
“Sorry.” Wilraven shook his head. “Yeah, those guys are our security detail.” He shrugged as if it was no big deal, tilted his head east, toward Cuba. “You know how dangerous it can get out here.”
He glanced over at Royce, who seemed to give him a slight approving nod, turning away as he caught the captain’s look, which Wilraven hoped conveyed something like I’ll bury you in the deep, you traitorous fuck.
Royce, uncomfortable under the glare, made some excuse to be elsewhere and strode off as if someone was calling him.
Wilraven made sure he stowed the expression before turning back to Drino. The captain of the Errantes wasn’t looking at him; his gaze was pointed into the sky about midway up through the rigging of Crane Two, one hand pressing on the comm gear jammed in his right ear.
Then he laughed lightly, lowering his gaze to Wilraven. “What’s Adam doing, sunbathing?”
Startled, Wilraven gave him a focused stare for a second, and then turned to look at Crane Two. “DuFour?” His brain was still catching up, but he pulled enough meaning out of Drino’s words. “You know where Adam is? Where?”
Drino’s smile slipped off his face as he read the concern in the captain’s. He looked up at the crane. “He’s atop it, on his back.” With only an instant’s pause, he jerked a thumb back at the Errantes, tapping his earpiece. “One of the kids is always flying an aerial video kite, sort of an advanced lookout for us. We use it mostly for fishing, tracking, whale spotting.” He tapped the earpiece. “He just reported on what he’s seeing on top of the southward crane.”
Wilraven let his gaze drift across the Errantes, following a line of sheds to a balcony on top of one. There were three or four young men and women—kids, really, probably no older than thirteen or fourteen—two of them handling the lines of a kite shifting back and forth sixty feet over the Errantes.
Drino laughed suddenly, weirdly, a very out-of-place reaction to something, and when Wilraven turned to him, it was clear there was something wrong.
It didn’t take more than one guess to get it right. Levesgue was standing right next to Wilraven. He had come up silently and was suddenly there, part of the conversation. He wore a barely tolerant smile, gesturing to Drino in a mildly threatening way.
“Sorry to say you can’t stay for long.” The soldier opened his arms wider, waving over the deck of the Irabarren. “You’re compromising the security of the mission—excuse me, the security of the job.”
He turned to Wilraven and gave him a good angry stare to make sure he was driving home the message. The captain swung back to Drino, nodding disappointedly and hoping Drino would take the hint, but dreading he wouldn’t.
Please, Drino, don’t mention Adam DuFour.
Wilraven couldn’t pass any signals because Levesgue would be onto that in a second. He just had to trust Drino’s intuition, the man’s experiences with trouble out on the waves, his sense that something dangerous was going on and that Levesgue shouldn’t be filled in on anything. He wasn’t trustworthy.
Wilraven wanted desperately to fold his arms, scowl back at Levesgue, but he was sure the soldier would just use it against him. He glanced around at the Marcene to see if he could catch any of the other soldiers reaching for weapons—or that missile launcher.
Could one missile sink the Errantes? Would it matter? Innocent people would die, torn apart by the explosion, fire ripping through the homes and farms and the nurseries of three newborns. And with the connections to power Levesgue seemed to have—shutting down an official Coast Guard emergency call-- there was no doubt in Wilraven’s mind that anything that happened could be covered under a blanket of lies: The Errantes was smuggling narcotics, transporting dangerous chemicals that got out of control. Fuel supplies ignited accidentally. Drino and the entire population of the Errantes could be wiped off the surface of the sea, and every detail of the story of their end could be dictated by Levesgue or whoever Levesgue worked for. Not necessarily Corkran. Wilraven couldn’t muster much doubt against both Levesgue and Corkran working for someone higher up the food chain.
If Wilraven and the crews of the Marcene and Irabarren were pawns, then Corkran and Levesgue were just more powerful middle-management pieces on someone’s game board.
Someone with the power to call off a Coast Guard emergency at sea. That meant high-level military or government connections. Calling off the CG didn’t even seem possible without raising alarms somewhere else. Wilraven had spent time thinking about that and had come up empty. Sure, communications could be manipulated. Someone posing as the captain of the Marcene could call back that everything was fine. Sorry, guys, that call was a mistake. But wouldn’t the Guard make a qualifying pass in those cases, just to make sure?
The United States Coast Guard, with fighter jets ready to scramble, had apparently dropped the emergency as if the call had never been made . . . That was a sign of seriously scary interference.
Wilraven sighed. There was no way he could fight that. And worse, he didn’t want to find himself—any of his crew—backed into a corner that left Levesgue no choice but to kill them all.
Shaking his head, Wilraven settled into what he hoped was reluctant agreement with a convincing tone in his voice. “He’s right, Drino. This job’s no place for the Errantes.” Glancing up with a frown, he added, “Or kids flying kites.”
Levesgue’s gaze shot up suspiciously, and counting on that, Wilraven caught Drino’s eye. He did the smallest shake of his head he could manage, shifting his eyes quickly to the crane where Adam DuFour had been found.
Drino dropped his gaze to the deck, sighed heavily, put a bit of shame into his stance and gestures. “No problem. I could see you boys had a lot going on when we slid over the horizon.” He looked around, gave them half a shrug. “Can we do a small trade for fuel? I have fresh roasted coffee.” He dragged out the last word and held up his open hand, looking back and forth between Wilraven and Levesgue. “Come on. Not much from you, and we’ll be out of here in under half an hour.”
Wilraven took his hand and shook it as he glanced south. “Before the storm hits.”
Chapter Thirty-two
Stormy
Wilraven was looking up at the gloomy sky, and through the pain in his shoulder and l
eg, there was a spark of hope. He could get around for a while without the crutch. He had gone through half the painkillers the doc had given him.
The plans he was considering to save Adam were gnawing at his thoughts, but anxiety—about failing and having Levesgue cripple him even more or go after the crew and blind, maim, or torture someone—was taking a toll too. With all of that climbing around in his head, he could still smile because they had found Adam, and it was good to see Damien out of the deco chamber and back in business. The diver was part of the team stowing everything that wasn’t bolted down in preparation for the coming weather. Damien had actually been released by the doc the day before, just after the captain had left with a fresh cast and strong meds, but it was the first time Wilraven had seen him.
The captain exchanged a happy grin with the diver and then made his way to Crane Two, where the operators Dewayne and Erich stood.
Erich lifted the bill of the old yellow-and-black Caterpillar baseball cap he wore.
Dewayne gave him a nod. “Cap?”
“Hey guys. Need a distraction. About five minutes to draw away the eyes of our minders with the guns. Something that will keep all eyes away from Crane Two, the Errantes, and the block of fuel we’ll be forklifting over in a few.”
Wilraven kept his voice low. Not just for Levesgue, but also Royce and any others who had been turned. He wasn’t certain about the ROV team. They had been all over Aro’s treasure find. The doc was good. His first officer, Angelo, was with him, of course. He had the most doubts about the Irabarren’s crew because he wasn’t as close to them as the Marcene’s, but not the crane ops. Dewayne and Erich were old hands. It would take more than death threats and Spanish silver to buy their silence—even more for their compliance. He was betting their loyalty wasn’t something that had a price.
Erich exchanged a look with Dewayne, then turned to the captain and said, “The ROV crane’s okay to swing around? Cause some mayhem?”
Dewayne made a surreptitious sweep of the railings and decks of the Marcene, clearly looking for any of Levesgue’s team. “How soon do you want this?”
“Soon as possible. Trying to save DuFour’s life.” That snapped up the attention of both the crane operators. The captain held out his open hands. “Tell you all about it later. Just make some noise and motion.”
It didn’t take long. Just a few minutes. Wilraven was on a straight line toward the Irabarren’s superstructure when the deck shook under his feet. There was a deep thudding crash followed by shouts of alarm.
Wilraven cut to his left and, despite his broken leg in the weird waterproof German cast, was scaling the safety ladder on Crane Two a moment later. He crawled across the top of the cab, his hands and the knees of his jeans smearing blood across the yellow-painted steel. Adam lay on his back in the shadow of the mounts and A-frame, one arm bent over his face, one hand pressed flat against a bloody wound low on the right side, just under the ribcage.
“Adam?” Wilraven breathed. “It’s Jay. We’re going to get you off of here. Get you some help.”
DuFour’s voice came back weak, barely a whisper, but he gripped Wilraven’s hand hard. “No. The soldiers will see me.”
“Don’t worry. Got you covered. Drino’s here. We’re going to sneak you aboard the Errantes. Soldiers think you’re dead.”
Adam laughed, cutting it off quickly with some choppy wet coughing. “Almost . . . am.”
Wilraven put his hand over DuFour’s. “Let me see.”
He peeled up his fingers, caked in dried blood, a thin black thread from his sewing kit winding around his wrist. Wilraven quickly found the end of the thread running through a needle neatly stuck into Adam’s torn and bloody shirt. He gently placed DuFour’s hand to the side and unthreaded the needle, setting it a few feet away. The sewn-up wound, a ragged slice just above his left hip, looked pale and greenish against his skin. Wilraven had to concentrate on hiding his reaction to all the blood and Adam’s self-doctoring. He slid the excess thread across his stomach and pulled down the shirt to cover the wound.
“Okay, I’m going to get you into a dry suit. I brought up one of the bigger, baggier ones, so it should go on and come off easy.” He lifted DuFour’s right leg just up from his boot and slid on the dull red suit, bunching it loosely at the thigh. He followed with the second leg, and then it was the hard part, getting Adam to roll to one side while tugging the suit higher, and then sitting up to get it all the way on.
Wilraven didn’t look at the chaos coursing across the Irabarren, and didn’t even dare to glance up at the Marcene to see if he was being watched. It took several minutes, a lot longer than he was hoping for, and Adam’s face showed he was at the end of his limit with the pain and lack of strength. He was completely drained, and Wilraven let him rest there for a few more minutes, eyes closed tight, breathing rapidly, while he pulled the zippers closed.
“Ready?”
Adam grabbed his arm, nodding weakly, whispering, “So you know. It was the blockheaded one. Caught him sabotaging the ROV . . . Wendolyn. Levesg . . . ” He coughed wetly. “Soldiers want no more treasure hunting dives. They wanted to make sure. ROV team was readying her for a morning dive . . . but the storm . . . ”
Wilraven glanced behind him at the rails and ladder. “Don’t talk anymore, unless you want to.” It looked as if it was taking too much out of him. He had to get aboard the Errantes or he would die. “Let’s go.” Wilraven slid his arms under Adam, who felt much lighter than normal, as if he’d lost more than just a bunch of blood hiding from Levesgue on the top of Crane Two’s control house.
With Adam’s legs hanging off the edge, Wilraven climbed over him, sliding halfway down the ladder before pulling his wounded friend onto one shoulder. “Grab the rails loosely, man. Let’s get to the deck as smoothly as possible.”
It took them another slow five minutes to get down, leaning against the big steel sides of the crane’s base. DuFour couldn’t hold his own weight, and his legs wobbled out from under him. He would have gone to the deck if Wilraven didn’t have one arm around him, his wrist looped through one of the safety straps up the back and his fingers clawing into the suit’s thick material. With his free hand he pulled the suit’s hood over Adam’s head, covering his face.
Wilraven caught Andres’ attention and gave him a thumbs-up. The dive master put the confusion plan into motion, directing his team—Damien, Telly, as well as Inda and Ranav—to carry half a dozen dry suits from the shaded racks of the dive shed across the middle of Irabarren’s deck into the sun on the southern side. They walked them across the open space like headless, baggy bodies, letting the arms and legs swing up and back in the wind. It was a parade of color and confusion.
Dozens of seagulls took flight, wheeling through the air, squealing and chattering at the sudden aggressive-appearing motion.
Time to move.
“Steady ahead. You keep your eyes closed if you want.” Wilraven drew a deep breath and walked into the open with DuFour, the painkillers keeping a lock on the ache in his leg and shoulder. “Good so far. Just lean on me, move your feet like you’re walking. I got you.”
“Hey!” Levesgue, standing twenty feet away, with his back to the captains of Marcene and Irabarren, shouted for the forklift to stop, waving his arms until one of the Shantz brothers, driving the lift, braked the machine. “Hold up right now.” He wasn’t even looking at Miles Shantz, but at the tarp-covered stackable crate of fuel containers. He waved a hand at it, disgusted, as if he suspected it was the sump pulled from a public latrine. “Someone want to tell me what the fuck this is?”
Shantz just looked at him as if he was crazy. The Marcene’s first officer stepped into the gap. Angelo had clearly seen Wilraven moving slowly toward the Errantes with someone in a drysuit. The first officer gestured wildly, then slapped the side of the big container affectionately, shouting over the commotion on the Irabarren’s deck. “It’s fuel oil.” Then he waved casually back to the Marcene, directing Levesgue’s att
ention that way. He said, “We normally use the boxes for offloading ship’s liquid fuel, but this is how Drino’s taking the trade.” He gave the killer a sincere smile and serious and-you-know-what-we’re-getting nod, miming a sip from a good cup of coffee.
Levesgue growled something at Angelo and came at the big box as if it had insulted him. He pulled out a knife and cut through the tarp, bending over it and peering inside to inspect what was underneath.
Almost at the edge of the Irabarren, the captain looked around, trying for casual, but that wasn’t easy. Levesgue appeared to be distracted for the moment, and he was hoping that none of Levesgue’s men up on Marcene were focused directly on him. Otherwise it might just look like the captain was helping the dive team dry out some gear. Human-shaped gear. Nothing to see here.
Wilraven had to stop to get a better grip with one arm around DuFour’s back, half walking half carrying him across the deck, still in the shadow of Crane Two, heading toward the Errantes. Going without the crutch for more than five minutes, with the addition of DuFour’s weight, seemed to have beaten back the meds. He was hobbling along now, and at each step a jolt of pain shot up his leg. His shoulder was throbbing with the bullet wound.
He ignored the pain. All he heard was Adam’s sucked-in breath at each step. All he could feel was Adam’s weakening grasp on his arm as they made their way from the safety of Crane Two.
His voice fading, Adam gasped out a final few words. “The Irabarren’s yours, Captain. Take care of her.”
“You know I will.”
At that moment—as if they had all coordinated efforts—Drino unleashed his contribution to the chaos. Twelve men and women, some as young as fifteen, some as old as seventy, dressed in colors that made Drino’s orange shorts look subdued, weaved their way through the dive team, heading toward the forklift with the porta-tank of fuel. Three of them were carrying big zip-bags full of roasted coffee beans, the agreed-on price for the fuel. The others came with fresh tomatoes, bundles of peppers, and other vegetables.