The Scuba Club

by Rene Fomby

  Instantly the memories flooded back. He was a young boy again, walking along a long wooden pier jutting out over a lake near his grandparents’ home in East Texas. He had never learned to swim, being from way out in West Texas where the lakes were few and far between. But the water didn’t scare him, and, even worse, he had never learned to respect it, so when another boy came running along the pier and bounced into him suddenly, sending him tumbling through the air and into the lake, he just assumed he would wind up bobbing happily along on the surface, just like all of the other kids he had seen that weekend.

  Except that Gavin wasn’t like all the other kids. Unknown to him or his parents, Gavin was lacking one crucial ability absolutely essential to fundamental water safety—buoyancy. Falling into the lake, he didn’t just pop back up to the surface like a cork on a fishing line, but instead he kept falling, further and further, deeper and deeper, until the bottoms of his feet finally rested on the muddy bottom of the lake. The urge to breathe gnawed at him like a wild animal, and somehow he knew instinctively that he needed to fight it. But time in the darkened depths of the silty lake seemed to stretch on forever, and eventually he gave up and gulped in a mouthful of water. And then another, and another, until his lungs seemed full to bursting with the cold, filthy water clinging to the bottom of the lake. His eyes went black, and then his brain, until he collapsed in a loose pile onto the bed of the lake, defeated.

  Luckily, Gavin’s father had seen everything happen from the opposite end of the pier and came running, yelling desperately for help and shedding his shirt and pants and shoes as he ran, then diving headfirst into the very spot where he thought he’d seen Gavin go in. It took him several tries to locate his drowning son, but finally he was able to fight his way down low enough to grab the boy by one arm and haul him to the surface. A Good Samaritan leaned over to pull Gavin up onto the pier and immediately started trying to resuscitate the small child. After several hard pumps to his ribs Gavin spat out a long stream of water, then another, and another, until it seemed like he must have sucked the entire lake up inside his tiny body. But with the water now out of him, Gavin was finally able to draw in a long, agonizing gasp of air. And then let it all out in an equally long and agonizing scream.

  Gavin’s issues with buoyancy—and his consequential primal fear of the open water—had remained a personal demon ever since that fateful day. He had taken up scuba diving in college, hoping that would help him overcome his panic every time he neared a seashore, or even a swimming pool, and it did help to some small degree. The buoyancy vests compensated for his natural tendency to sink, and after several minutes underwater his panic would begin to slowly recede, like a wave pulling back from the shoreline. Even if it never fully disappeared.

  But now he wasn’t wearing a vest, and his heavy clothes tugged hard at him, pulling him down toward the bottom of the bay like a giant invisible hand. Quickly he kicked off his shoes, then worked to free both arms from his jacket. Once his left arm was free he fought with the shoulder strap that was holding his gun, and was just about to give up on that and simply unclip the pistol and drop it into the void when the back of his hand brushed against something in the water, something almost invisible in the inky depths of the sea. He flipped his hand around and grasped for it, searching, his lungs now burning for air and demanding that he open his mouth and breath in… and then he had it. The anchor line. The braided nylon rope was thick and every bit as taut as a fiddle string, and he held onto it as if his very life depended upon it. Which, of course, it did. Slowly he worked his way up the rope, hand over hand, never knowing when or if he would ever breech the surface. The effort ate away at the limited reserves of oxygen he had left, and he strained almost as hard against the urge to suck in mouthfuls of seawater as he did to pull himself upwards. Finally, just as he was about ready to give up all hope and let go of his lifeline, his left hand burst into the open air for only a brief second before being covered up again by a passing wave. Gavin bit down hard and threw his right hand up over his left, hauling upward with all his might, until finally he pulled his head above the waves, greedily sucking in long gasps of air even as he collapsed against the anchor line with exhaustion.

  40

  Cozumel Bay

  After his almost superhuman effort to survive his attempted drowning, Gavin was completely spent, and he knew his chances of being able to pull himself up on board the boat did not look promising. He could try and swim around to the rear boarding platform, but to do that he would have to let go of the anchor line, and even if he left the rest of his clothing and his gun to the mercies of the ocean, he was under little illusion that he would ever complete the journey before he joined them all on the ocean floor. There had to be a better way.

  Then it came to him. His gun. It had been underwater for a long time, and it was soaked with seawater to boot, but if he shook the water out of the barrel there was a good chance he could make it work, at least once. And one time was all he needed. Holding onto the anchor line with his left hand, he unclipped the holster with his right and drew out the pistol, shaking it violently to remove as much water as possible before holding it away from his body as far as he could manage and pulling the trigger, his eyes squeezed tight as if they could somehow protect his ears from the coming explosion.

  Click.

  Damn it! He shook the gun again and, pointing the business end toward the open ocean, pulled the trigger once more.

  This time it fired, and even with the violence of the storm pounding the sea all around him, the noise it made was unmistakable. Almost instantly Tony leapt out of his cabin in the starboard pontoon, and Gavin yelled with a throat hoarse from saltwater and exertion to get his attention.

  “Gavin! What the hell—”

  “Tony, quick, go grab the top sheet off your bed,” Gavin shouted over the roar of the sea and storm. Espinosa spun around without hesitation and raced back into his cabin, returning seconds later with the sheet. Gavin had returned his gun to its holster and clicked it in, and now waved his free right hand toward the Mexican federal agent. “Tie a small knot in one corner and toss it out to me. Hurry!” Gavin knew that time was critical—he wasn’t sure just how long he could hold on to the small anchor line, particularly since he was all the while getting pounded by the unrelenting waves from the storm.

  It took Espinosa several tries to get the end of the sheet to him, but finally Gavin grasped the knotted end and wrapped it several times around his right arm. “Okay now, Tony, listen up,” he yelled. “I need you to lead me to the very rear of the boat, where I can climb up using the swim platform. That means I need you to keep my head above water with the sheet and walk me around to the back. Think you can manage it?”

  “Got it. No problem,” Espinosa yelled back, and slowly the two of them began circumnavigating the right side of the boat, Gavin gaining an increasing appreciation of just how long sixty-seven feet was as Espinosa worked his end of the sheet around various fittings and wires mounted along the edge. Finally they rounded the stern, and Espinosa pulled hard on the sheet to reel Gavin’s upper body on board the swim platform before jumping down onto the platform and grabbing his colleague by the arms, lifting Gavin the rest of the way to safety.

  The two men sat side by side on the little platform, both breathing heavily. Espinosa was the first to break the silence. “Look, I can see you wanting to go for a little swim, especially given this lovely weather we’ve been enjoying lately, but wouldn’t you agree this is neither the time nor the place to do so?” he asked with a laugh.

  Gavin snorted, whether from sheer nervousness or exhaustion or in response to Espinosa’s feeble attempt at humor, even he didn’t know for sure. “Yeah, well, back when I was a kid, all the other boys used to say I was a real pushover. Now I guess they’ve all been proven right.”

  Espinosa raised an eyebrow, waiting patiently for the rest of the explanation.

  Gavin continued, wiping the rain from his eyes as he d
id. “I was down in my cabin, after apparently falling dead asleep soon after I got there, when I woke up to the sound of something tapping on the hull just above my head. I went up on top to check it out, but didn’t see anything other than a light shining at the bow of the boat somewhere near the water level. When I leaned out to see what it was, someone grabbed me by the ankles and tossed me overboard. I sank like a rock, and was just about to give up the ghost and join Katy Mulcahey, when my hand brushed against the rope connecting the anchor to the front of the boat. If I hadn’t lucked upon that, I’d have been goners for sure.”

  Now that he was drenched to the bone from the rain and couldn’t get any wetter, Espinosa decided he was in no hurry to head back to the relative comfort of the main cabin. Especially now that they were dealing with a second deadly attack in this case. With the attacker clearly one of the five individuals sitting just inside. “Hmm. Billie commented this morning at breakfast that the winds had shifted and were now fighting the prevailing northbound current, so he had to swing the boat around and set a rear anchor to keep us from spinning around or drifting. So you really got lucky, if you think about it. The current must have pushed you in the direction of the forward anchor line even as you descended. If that had happened yesterday the current would have taken you the opposite way, and we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now.”

  “Pleasant thought,” Gavin observed ruefully. “You always such a bright refreshing ray of sunshine, Detective Espinosa? Or do I just seem to bring it out in you?”

  “Hey, like the saying goes, the world hands you limes, you make margaritas, right?”

  Gavin snorted again. “That saying goes a little differently in my country, but I kinda like your version better.” He paused. “But that still doesn’t answer the critical question here. Who the hell tried to kill me?”

  Espinosa considered that, and meanwhile started to rethink the wisdom of sitting on a tiny swim platform in the middle of a raging ocean storm, fully clothed, having already survived one rogue wave and with a known but as yet unknown killer aboard apparently desperate to end the investigation. Using any and all means possible. “The answer to that question will probably require a new round of questioning, but the obvious answer here is Trevor. First of all, he’s the number one through ten suspect in the primary murder. Second, he’s all alone, so there’s no one in his cabin to notice him leaving it in the middle of the afternoon and throwing you overboard. And, as we all know, 99 percent—”

  “Of the time, it’s the husband,” Gavin finished with another snort. “I think it’s way past time to head inside, my friend.”

  41

  Salon

  Gavin and Espinosa had them all lined up on the cream leather couch, every one of them looking nervous but at least one of them knowing why. The two agents had changed into jeans and T-shirts they had stashed into their overnight bags, but their shirts still showed the liquid evidence of their respective mad dashes from their small cabins to the main salon.

  Gavin took the lead, his face lined with a deep scowl. “Ladies and gentlemen, at or about one hour ago I was awakened in my cabin by a sound emanating from somewhere immediately above my head. I went up top to investigate, and in the process I was summarily wrestled overboard by an unknown assailant, and as a byproduct of that attack I almost drowned. That assailant—or assailants, for that matter—are sitting with you at this very moment on that couch. So as you might imagine, our primary purpose at this juncture is to determine which of you may have had the opportunity and the motive to throw me overboard. And, in the interest of complete candor, I happen to take any attempt at ending my life quite personally, even if it wasn’t completely successful. Are we all perfectly clear about all this?”

  All five suspects nodded.

  “Good. Now, normally this stage of the investigation would call for Detective Espinosa to use a set of pliers to remove fingernails, or possibly even the strategic application of electricity to various relatively sensitive parts of your bodies, but given that I’m a bit squeamish, I’ve asked him to hold off on that for the time being. I’m truly hoping that you five won’t make such measures necessary.” Gavin read the result of his subtle threat on each of their faces, and inwardly smiled. And for the first time since he had started this case, it was the smile of a predator. This was no longer about identifying the most likely perpetrator and then moving on. It was about finding a killer, and he now had no intention of stopping until he’d found the right one. Or ones, for that matter.

  “Okay, let’s start with Casey and Jillian. Where exactly were you one hour ago?”

  Casey glanced at his fiancé with hooded eyes for a moment before answering. “Uh, that would be around three? I can’t be sure, since I don’t have a clock down there, but I’d say we were both—busy.”

  “Busy? In what way?” Gavin asked.

  “You know. Busy.” Casey looked uncomfortable saying anything more, and Jillian’s cheeks blushed bright red as she stared out the window across from the couch, not making eye contact with anyone.

  “Oh. I see.” Gavin raised one eyebrow, and noticed that Brett and Trevor were sharing a knowing smile. “My next question was going to be, did anyone else witness what you were up to at the time, but I’m guessing that would be a no.”

  Casey and Jillian didn’t say anything, so he moved on.

  “Brett, you and Tara. Do you two have any kind of alibi for what you were doing at around three?”

  Brett shrugged, still wearing his impish little grin from Casey’s revelation. “Tara and I were taking a nap. And, by that, I mean actually sleeping. Neither of us were up and about until you knocked on our door about thirty minutes ago and woke us up. And I’m a light sleeper, so I would have noticed if Tara had crawled out of bed for some reason.” Tara looked over at him and nodded.

  “I see. Well, then, can anyone else confirm your stories?”

  Tara spoke up. “Obviously, Casey and Jillian were—busy—at the time, so that would leave Trevor. And no, I don’t recall him sticking his head in our cabin after we went to bed. Plus, we had the door locked from the inside, so unless he hung over the side of the boat and peered in through the side window…”

  Trevor shifted nervously in place. “I guess that leaves me. And no, I was reading a magazine in my cabin, but I was obviously all by myself in there. So, no witnesses to prove up my alibi. Next time I guess I’ll need to be a bit more careful about all that. Make sure I remain at all times in plain sight.”

  Espinosa glanced up at Gavin and mouthed a silent “99 percent.” Gavin nodded and turned to face Trevor. “Okay, then. Mr. Johnson, I think we may need to have another frank discussion with you while we wait for the harbor pilot to arrive. Would everyone else mind returning to their cabins in the meantime?”

  The two couples eyed Trevor meaningfully as they trekked down the steps to the port pontoon. Gavin watched them silently, noting that Casey and Jillian were camped out in the aft cabin, while Brett and Tara had the fore cabin. He made a note to examine the fore cabin a little closer the first chance he got. And one other cabin, as well.

  42

  Trevor

  Trevor had clearly read the writing on the wall and determined that he was now the primary suspect in his wife’s disappearance. He carefully considered whether to clam up now and take his chances with Mexican justice, but he was still unsure what the consequences of that move might be. As Espinosa and Gavin pulled up chairs on either side of the couch, facing him, a light sheen broke out across his forehead.

  “So is this the point where I break down and confess that I killed Katy?” he asked, the words coming out a little too quickly in Gavin’s opinion. But then, he himself had never been in this kind of situation before, trapped on a boat in a foreign country accused of murder.

  Espinosa cocked his head to one side. “That depends, Trevor. Are you guilty? Did you in fact do it?”

  “No. Of course not. But I guess that doesn
’t mean all that much at this point.” Trevor’s hands were shaking, and he was staring down at them, as if he was trying to will them to stop moving. “I get it. I was in the perfect position to slip back behind the group and do it. Kill Katy, I mean. My little dive knife was apparently somehow involved as the murder weapon, and it was found at the scene. And then I was the only person on board without an alibi when you were attacked and thrown overboard,” he said, nodding solemnly toward Gavin. “I suppose, given all that, I’d suspect me, too. But the thing is, I didn’t do it. Katy and I were in love, she was the best thing that ever happened in my life. The last thing I’d ever want is to see her dead.”

  Gavin consulted his notepad for a brief moment, flipping through several pages before looking up and studying Trevor with a practiced eye. “You say the two of you were in love. Are you telling us everything was hunky-dory with Katy back home, that the two of you weren’t starting to run into some rocky spots in your marriage?”

  Trevor shook his head, but his eyes slowly danced between Gavin and Espinosa. “No, things were just fine. In fact, she was really excited about coming along on this little trip, trying out the catamaran for the first time. We were hoping to take some lessons this summer, and maybe in the next year or so try sailing the Sea Trial out into the Caribbean, or somewhere else equally exotic. Maybe even through the Panama Canal.”