Brant calmed slightly. “She’s fine. In fact, wait a minute.” The captain pressed the button to activate the loudspeaker.
“Hi, guys.” Steel’s voice broadcast to the room, sounding shaken. Sam McCall smiled, and her heart skipped at the thought he cared enough to be worried about her. “So what’s going on?” His tone had changed back to its usual steady calmness.
McCall knew he was probably crouched forwards, his hands on his temples ready for any input. She smiled at the image, one she had missed, and remembered him either lying on cars catching the day’s sun or sitting and just watching the world go by, letting his mind work overtime.
“In the past couple of days we have had a couple of strange deaths. Well, five to be precise.” Tony spoke louder than normal at the cell phone, leaning towards it.
“So what? It’s New York.” Steel sounded bemused by the lack of information.
“Also, someone broke into the ME’s office and stole one of the bodies.” Tooms’s voice boomed across the room to the phone, making everyone back away slightly.
“Was anyone hurt?” John Steel asked. “Is Tina okay?”
Sam smiled because his concern was so touching—he almost seemed to care.
“Well, she was locked into a freezer room for a while,” Tooms answered. “But they say she’ll be okay.”
There was a long pause.
“Steel?” Sam McCall leant forwards, her mouth almost directly above the phone. “Are you still there?”
“What? Yes, I’m just thinking. How far apart were the deaths?”
Everyone looked confused for a moment.
“They’re not related, Steel,” said Captain Brant. “A bunch of accidents and suicides, that’s all.” He was dismissive, yet knew it was impossible to know what Steel was trying to put together.
“Tell me, how far apart were these deaths?” Steel repeated, his voice angry and inpatient.
“Couple of days, tops,” Tony replied.
“So what links these deaths?” Steel’s voice sounded calmer.
“They’re not related, Steel,” Tony told him. “Didn’t you hear what the captain said?”
There was another brief pause before Steel spoke again: “Okay. You have five deaths in a short time. One body gets taken from a secure building, and Tina is locked into the freezer. Okay. So why didn’t they kill her? Would have been easy enough—no witnesses.”
Everyone scowled at the phone, not believing what they were hearing.
“Steel, what’s your point before I disconnect you?” yelled the infuriated captain.
“My point is, they could have taken it when she was on call, or away for the weekend, say. But they chose to do it when she was there.” Steel imagined them sitting around in the office he knew so well.
“You said they were all accidents or suicides, Captain. But are you sure?”
Brant looked awkwardly at the cell phone.
“We were starting the investigations into all of them when Tina was attacked.” His words were softened by the admission.
“Okay,” John Steel went on. “Look at this way. If you want to stop an investigation into some deaths, what do you do? First you scare the pants of the ME who would be doing the autopsies. Then you get everyone working on the urgent breakin, leaving the other cases to go cold.”
Brant stood up from the corner of Tony’s deck where he’d been sitting. He realised that maybe he had been fooled.
“Well, I’ll be the son of a...” he growled, throwing his prized mug across the room; it merely slid across the floor, unbroken.
“Whoever did this knows you’re short-staffed,” Steel warmed to his idea, “and they know the layout of the ME’s office and her schedule. What’s today? Saturday. So finding a standin ME at short notice will take time, and they know this. You’re looking for professionals.”
Brant walked round, his hands clenched round his head in anger.
“The bastards played me! I messed up and they played me!”
McCall looked up at him as he circled the floor, venting his fury.
“Captain Brant,” the English investigator assured him.
“You are a good man and you care about your team, that’s what they were counting on. Get everyone back on those murder cases, and let robbery deal with the breakin.” And with that he was gone.
Brant composed himself before he addressed them all:
“Okay, everybody, listen up. Everyone stop what you were doing on the breakin, and all those who were investigating those five cases move on those. I’ll get robbery to take over here, so have any notes you have handed over to them. Okay, let’s go.” He clapped his massive hands in a display of encouragement and sat down again.
“Okay, people. We find a connection between the people, we find who did this. Let’s find these tricky bastards.”
A blazing sun was just breaking the surface of the horizon, turning the calm swell of the ocean a deep orange. The clear sky was a fiery glow, with a cloud line rising up like a distant mysterious land. A fresh sea breeze had a fresh chill to it and the tang of salt filled the senses. As the monstrous ship made its way towards the Spanish coast it would have to pass between the coasts of Costa de Vela and the small island of Illa de Monte Agudo. Steel sat up in his bed and stretched after his night’s rest. It had been a short sleep, as his guests did not leave until around three that morning. He looked over at the electronic clock on the other side of the bed. The display showed it was almost half past six. He put on his dressing gown and collapsed back in the comfortable bed and moaned.
Outside in the mouth of the Ria de Vigo small craft darted here and there. In front of the ship, as the land narrowed, massive structures and the white beaches of two cities came into view.
On the left was Balea, a hilltop farmland with a small, secluded bay full of small boats, rocky cliffs, and a beach of powdery white sand. On the left was their destination: Vigo. This had a massive harbour area called Bouzas, with warehouses and anchor points for large and small vessels. The city itself was a bustling metropolis full of tourists.
On the bridge, the crew stood ready, awaiting the second-in-command’s orders for manoeuvring into the harbour. Above was the chatter of the port and the noise of the guiding vessel. The captain sat in his chair and watched, ready to jump towards the controls if he thought anything was amiss. But he had faith in his crew and in his second-in-command.
“Okay, Mr. Truman,” Captain Long said.
“Take her in nice and steady as she goes.”
The pilot repeated the orders and began the task. Captain Long just sat and grinned, his mind wandering back to a simpler time when ships had sails, and you had to follow the stars.
Steel looked out across the bay, the new day’s sun turning the cityscape a glorious orange. The sound of the ocean’s spray against the ship’s hull and the flocks of gulls above swooping playfully, filled his ears. He took a deep breath of the fresh natural breeze. The city was alive and busy, small boats making haste into one of the many jetties. On the land, commuters in their cars and trucks hurried to their places of work. He smiled at the scene. After only a few days on the ship the world somehow felt less lonely, less as though those on board ship were the only ones on the planet.
He left the thick glass balcony wall and sat in one of the wicker chairs. Reaching over, he picked up the teacup and sipped the steaming hot brew. The colour of the tea matched the burnt orange of the buildings across the bay. As he held the cup with both hands and went to bring it to his lips he stopped, and his mind began to wander, to calculate. Maybe the reason he had not found out anything was that whatever he was looking for wasn’t yet there. When they docked, they would be bringing on new passengers and cargo destined for New York. He pondered the theory and took another sip of tea. The steam vapour filled his nostrils with a hint of Earl Grey. He looked over at his cell phone that rested neatly beside the saucer. He needed to speak to Detective McCall and discover what she had found about Callan Indust
ries.
He dialled her number, and as he listened to ringing tones, he wondered what sort of greeting he would get. Their last conversation was a while back and that didn’t really go as he had planned, but he couldn’t blame her really. As the phone continued to ring, he started to get an uneasy feeling. Normally she would have answered it straight away, and if she was unavailable she would set it to voicemail. Something was wrong. The ringing stopped. Someone had answered.
“McCall?” he said. “Listen, it’s Steel. Look...” He looked at the cell phone, somewhat surprised to hear Captain Brant answering it.
“No shit,” yelled the captain.
“Look, let me.....” Steel tried to explain, but the captain ripped into him. Something was definitely wrong, for sure. The captain was not normally what you would call social when he was mad, but this was something else.
“Look, Mister, you wanted to be on this team, and where are you? On a goddamn cruise!”
Their conversation lasted around fifteen minutes and at the end, he had learnt nothing about what he had originally called about. However, what he had learnt just added to the puzzle. Somebody wanted those people who had died in New York out of the way for a reason, but what was it? Something was happening back in New York, that was for certain. Then he remembered something Captain Long had said about the ship, about how it was an Anglo-American venture. The ship had been built in Britain and the electronics and fittings had been installed in the U.S.
The hairs on the back of his neck raised, and a chill ran down his spine. What if something was aboard and always had been? What if the whole ship was the reason he was here? He shook his head at the idea. It was stupid. In a few hours, the passengers would be released into the welcoming city and the ship would be mostly empty. Empty enough for him to finally take a look at the lower decks.
He thought back to the dead engineer, Walter. Had he seen something or heard something he shouldn’t have done? It wasn’t until he was below decks that something had happened to the boy. Steel had too many questions and too few answers. As he looked out at the tranquil Spanish scenery, he took another sip from his tea. He looked up as the ship’s horn bellowed a deep tone, signalling its approach to the port. After today, they would be at sea for ten days, then reach their final destination, New York. If something was going to happen, it would be during that time.
The knock on his door made him get up from the wicker chair. As he walked past the dresser table, he grabbed for the black suit jacket that hung from the back of the chair that was in front of it. He stopped and looked in the long mirror; his clothes were entirely black, including a black silk shirt with the top two buttons undone. Picking up his black sunglasses, he placed them on, then brushed down his jacket. With a self-confident smile, he headed for the door.
Steel opened the door and removed his key card. Tia May stood in the doorway. She wore a sleeveless white T-shirt and beige shorts. Brown T-straps criss-crossed her feet and the wooden heels boosted her height even though she was fairly tall in the first place. Large red-rimmed sunglasses covered her beautiful sparkling eyes.
“Morning, Antony. I trust you slept well.” She looked him up and down.
“Good morning, Tia. Hope you didn’t have any more visitors last night.”
She gave a broad smile. “What if I said yes? Would you be jealous?”
“Depends what they came for. Any more mad Scotsmen and they’re your problem.”
She stood for a moment and assessed his outfit with a critical frown.
“Don’t you have anything with colour in it?” she asked, shaking her head.
“Only my life, Tia,” he replied. “Only my life.”
The crowds of people herded themselves like needy cattle heading towards a grazing area.
“So, Antony, what did you have in mind for today?” Tia asked him as they walked slowly against the tide of people.
“Oh, I thought I would check out the rest of the ship. And you?”
She didn’t look up at him as she spoke, her attention was elsewhere.
“Oh, that’s a shame. I thought we might go to this little café I have heard of in the town, it’s meant to be really very lovely.”
The investigator could feel himself being cheated of his chance to check out the ship’s lower decks. On the other hand, Tia and her friends knew something and getting to know her better might help him find out what it was.
“Alright, why not?” Steel said as he caught a glimpse of the two goons from the night before. If they were off the ship and they followed, he would at least have the advantage of dealing with them in an open space. And there’d be a lot less explaining to do if it came to blows.
TWELVE
Alan Metcalf waited outside room 702, the key card tucked securely into his left palm. He waited until the corridor was clear before using the card and entering. The room was pitch black with only a handful of blue chemical glow sticks on the ground to mark the route to the chair. He had done this many times on this and other trips and he found it tedious. He found the chair and sat down.
“Soon everyone will be in the city, and then you can go back and look for it.” His words were delivered nervously in her presence.
“How can you be sure it will be there?” The woman’s voice was deep, sultry, and full of doubt.
“Something happened yesterday. An engineer was killed.”
There was an eerie silence.
“So, what of it?” Her almost cold response made him shiver.
“The boy delivered something to the captain that very day, and then.....”
“And then someone shut him up, is that what you are saying?”
Alan nodded, then realised that he was in the dark and she couldn’t see him.
“Yes, exactly. I think whatever he delivered is what we have been looking for.”
If she could have seen his face, she would have seen him smiling. His eyes closed as he tried to imagine what she looked like, his fantasy fuelled by intrigue.
“Don’t worry, if it’s there I will find it, don’t you worry,” she assured him.
“And you, Mr Metcalf? What will you be doing?”
“Oh, I have some personal business that needs my attention. Been putting it off for a long time now.” Alan grinned as evil thoughts filled his mind.
“Leave me now, I must prepare.”
He stood and made for the door, his hands brushing against it, searching for the handle. Finally, turning it, he was outside. His back was pressed firmly against the wall, and his head was raised, gasping for air as though he had just run a marathon. Her words were like a siren’s song to him—mysterious and deadly:
“Yes, I have some very personal business to deal with.” As he headed for the elevators, he almost seemed to skip.
The morning sun felt warm on Steel’s skin as he ventured down the gangway to the dock below. Beside him Tia May had her arm interlinked with his, as if they were a couple, newly in love. At the dockside, the other passengers hurried along in a great precession. The sun was not fully up but its warmth had started to take the slight chill out of the air.
“So, Tia, where do you suggest we go?” His words were playful, yet somewhat suspicious. Why didn’t she want him snooping around the lower decks? he wondered.
Taxis lined up on the streets, ready to hijack unsuspecting tourists for trade. Steel waved down one of the yellow cabs and opened the back door.
“Why thank you, kind sir,” Tia said, smiling. They drove through the busy streets for what seemed like hours. All the while Steel made a mental note of their journey, registering bars, churches, anything out of the ordinary he could class as a landmark. It was a trick he had picked up in his military career: pick a landmark so you can make a map in your head to get yourself home.
“So where exactly are we going?” he asked.
She turned and smiled. It was a smile that said ‘Trust me’. Nevertheless, he was in a strange land with a gorgeous but mysterious woman that he knew ver
y little about.
“First I have to meet with someone,” she explained, “then we can have dinner together, maybe take in some sights.”
They stopped outside the entrance to a small communal area, with a grassy space, restaurants, and a café. Its circular centre was enclosed by five towering block structures, making a cylindrical shape. Each block consisted of a group of four to five different buildings, which had been constructed to make one structure that housed a hollow centre to the blocks.
Branching off from the large open-spaced centre, five broad walkways broke up the enclosure. Steel looked round and became suddenly nervous. This wasn’t so much a meeting place as a brilliant place for an ambush. He wondered just which idiot picked this place. His mind worked overtime on scenarios: where was the best place to shoot from, where were the escape routes if they were needed.
“So where are we meeting this guy of yours?” he asked.
She stopped and looked at the pizza restaurant across the road.
“I am meeting him in there. You can come in, but you’ll have to sit alone. Got it?”
He liked how forceful she tried to sound, but then reasoned that with that face and that body she didn’t really have to shout to get people to do things.
Steel insisted that they stick to the sides of the buildings rather than walking straight down the middle. Although there were plenty of people around, Steel knew that if he was right they were dealing with unscrupulous guys who didn’t care about killing bystanders. The restaurant was small, but big enough for twenty to thirty people at the most, and had a glass-windowed front. It was early morning so the midday rush had not set in yet, leaving plenty of seating inside. Outside several tables and chairs were been occupied by customers sipping lattes.
As they walked in a waitress approached and greeted them, with a “Buenos días.” The brown haired waitress was short and slim, and her brilliant smile seemed genuine and welcoming.
“Buenos días,” Tia replied.
“A table for two?” the waitress asked, picking up two menus. Her mastery of English seemed good, and she had a sensuous Spanish accent.
Operation:UNITY (John Steel series Book 2) Page 13