by J B Black
“What about our brothers who were there? Have you heard from any of them?” Tariq asked.
“No General, I have not heard from any of our brothers and from what I’ve seen of the news video, I doubt anyone survived the attack. What do you want me to do, General?” the Captain asked.
“What is your next port of call?” Tariq asked.
“Port-au-Prince.”
“Leave immediately,” Tariq said. “I will contact you later with further instructions.”
CHAPTER 42
Sailor Creek Road
Lillian, Alabama
Friday, May 7, 2010
1:10 p.m. CDT
Reb’s SUV pulled up in front of the gate at what had been Ramon Vicario’s residence on Sailor Creek. Reb sounded the horn and waited. After a couple of minutes, a man dressed in hooded disposable white coveralls and calf high rubber boots came out of the house and walked out to the gate. He was obviously a member of the clean-up crew Jake had sent for last night.
Reb got out of the SUV and walked up to the gate. The man said, “Are you Reb?”
“I am,” Reb replied.
The man opened the gate and said, “I got a call from Deputy Director Gant before he flew back to Washington. He said you’d be coming by to get your boat.”
“Hold on just a second, please,” Reb said. He turned and made a come-on gesture toward the SUV.
The front passenger door on the SUV opened and Rusty got out and headed over to join Reb.
Honey and Sarah, who were headed to the airport over in Pensacola so Sarah could catch a flight home, got out of the rear of the SUV and got into the front seats of the SUV, with Honey behind the wheel.
As Honey and Sarah drove off, Reb and Rusty walked through the open gate.
After closing the gate, the man in the white coveralls handed Reb a large expanding file folder and said, “These are all of the boat’s papers we could find inside the house. The previous owner was kind enough to leave behind all of the paper work on the boat. We found it in a file cabinet in his office. There’s a big key ring in there, too, with two sets of all of the boat’s keys. The guy was real organized. All of the keys are labeled so you’ll know what they’re for.”
“Thanks,” Reb said.
“No problem,” the man said before turning to go back to the house.
“Well, let’s go see what kind of a boat you got for your nine dollars,” Rusty said.
When they entered the boat house, Rusty said, “This is some layout.”
The big boat house was almost empty. Of the five boat slips, only two had boats in them. One was the sole surviving Fountain 38 CC and the other was the Donzi R-80 sportfishing yacht.
“Wow, that’s one hell of a nice boat you got for your nine dollars, Reb,” Rusty exclaimed as he admired the beautiful sportfisherman.
“I’m glad you like it,” Reb said. “Why don’t you start the engines up while I get the door open and bring in the lines?”
After opening the overhead door and bringing in the lines, Reb joined Rusty up on the flying bridge, took the Captain’s chair, and spent a few minutes familiarizing himself with the controls.
Reb put the port side engine in reverse and gently applied power. When the boat fully cleared the boat house, Reb engaged the port bow thruster and swung the bow around until it was pointed downstream. With the bow pointing downstream, Reb turned off the bow thruster, put both engines in forward gear, and slowly advanced the throttles.
It was a beautiful day for a boat ride. The sun was out and the sky was mostly blue with only a few white clouds in the sky. The temperature was already in the mid-80s.
It being a weekday, Reb and Rusty saw hardly any boat traffic on the creek as they passed by the homes lining the banks on both sides of Sailor Creek. Those boats they did see were either retirees out fishing or out sightseeing. Just before they came to where Sailor Creek flowed into Perdido Bay, they passed a couple of anglers in a bass boat who were trolling along the bank of the creek casting for red fish in the brackish water. Reb and Rusty waved and the two fishermen waved back.
When they entered Perdido Bay, Reb turned to Rusty and said, “You up for taking her for a spin out in the Gulf?”
“Sure, let’s see what she’ll do,” Rusty replied.
Reb set course for Perdido Pass and they headed in a southwesterly direction toward Bayou Saint John. When they reached Bayou Saint John, Reb steered around the northwest side of Ono Island and, a short distance later, they passed by Walker Island on their starboard side. Then they cleared the northwestern tip of Ono Island on their port side and, up ahead, Reb and Rusty could easily make out the bridge spanning Perdido Pass.
As soon as the big boat cleared the pass and entered the Gulf of Mexico, Reb pushed the throttles all the way forward. He wanted to see what the big boat could do. The first of the diesel engine’s turbo chargers spooled up and the big boat accelerated smoothly. The second set of turbos kicked in at around 1,500 rpm and, about 30 seconds later, the third set of turbo chargers kicked in. In what seemed like no time at all, the readout on the boats instruments indicated they were traveling along at 45 miles per hour. Reb was amazed at how quiet the engine noise was compared to the outboard engines on the Revenge. He and Rusty were able to converse without shouting.
Reb looked over at Rusty and said, “She’s got good acceleration for a big boat.”
Rusty grinned and said, “That she has.”
It was a little windy and there was a slight chop on the water, but the boat was equipped with a ride control system that automatically adjusted the boat’s ride for the motion of the sea conditions it encountered and Reb and Rusty were treated to a very smooth ride.
After putting the big sportfisherman through her paces for about an hour, Reb set course for Rusty’s Marina.
“Well, what do you think?” Rusty asked.
“Best nine dollars I ever spent at auction for something,” Reb answered. “Seriously, I am really impressed with this big boat’s performance. It may be a little slower than the Revenge’s top speed, but you sure get there in style.”
“So, have you decided on what you’re going to call her?” Rusty asked.
“Yeah,” Reb said. “I’m going to call her, Reb’s Revenge II.”
“So, she’ll still be the Revenge for short,” Rusty said.
“That’s right,” Reb said. “It’s a shame that I don’t have any customers I can take out on the new Revenge though, because of this business of the never ending oil leak out in the Gulf right now. By the way, what do you think about the lack of response by the White House regarding the oil leak, Rusty?”
“Here we are with what’s turning into a serious crisis for the Gulf of Mexico and the surrounding states and, so far, we haven’t heard a peep out of the White House,” Rusty said. “What do I think? I’m not surprised. What has this guy ever done? Has he ever run a business? Ever had to meet a payroll? No, he’s an academic turned politician. He can’t debate the oil leak to make it go away. So, what I think is going on is they’re hoping like hell the oil company can cap the leak and they’re going to keep their heads down while that scenario plays itself out. I think they call that leading from behind. God, save us from these politicians and their flunkies who are oh so much smarter than us regular folks are.”
“My sentiments exactly,” Reb said.
* * *
When they arrived at Rusty’s Marina, Honey was standing on the dock in her sundress looking absolutely gorgeous.
After Reb finished tying the new Revenge up to the dock, Honey said, “How do you like your new boat?”
“I like her a lot,” Reb said. “I can’t wait to take you out for a ride in her and do some fishing. And you should see the bed in the master cabin. I can’t wait to get you in it.”
“Speaking of which,” Honey said, “I called a maid service to come clean and disinfect the boat from stem to stern. I told them to remove all of the linens on board and to burn them. So, we’
ll need to get all new linens for the boat and then we can give the bed a proper breaking in.”
“Sounds good to me sweetheart,” Reb said. “So, what are we going to do about supper?”
“That’s what I love about you, Reb,” Honey said. “If you’re not thinking about sex, you’re thinking about what you’re having for your next meal.”
CHAPTER 43
Reb’s Condo
Seaside Beach, Alabama
Saturday, May 8, 2010
7:15 a.m. CDT
Reb and Honey were out on the balcony of Reb’s condo sitting at the patio table under the shade of the table’s big umbrella drinking their first coffee of the morning. For several minutes, Reb and Honey sat there silently drinking coffee and watching the waves rolling in on the beach down below. They could see some people out walking on the beach and some other people playing in the surf.
Reb took out his smartphone and started checking to see if he had any messages for his charter fishing business.
Reb got so engrossed in what he was reading that he was completely oblivious to the fact that Honey had removed her T-shirt—exposing her bare breasts—in an effort to get his attention.
“Dammit, Reb,” Honey shouted in exasperation, “what does a girl have to do to get noticed around here?”
Startled, Reb looked up and immediately saw what Honey meant. He looked a little higher up and saw the look of exasperation on her face and said, “Damn. I’m sorry sweetheart, I didn’t mean to ignore you.”
“Yeah, it’s not like you to ignore little ole me when I’m half naked and coming on to you,” Honey said. “So, what the hell’s going on with you this morning?”
Reb threw up his hands in frustration and said, “I keep getting these messages from customers who are cancelling their fishing trips with me because of that damn oil spill out in the Gulf. Just when I was thinking about telling everybody they’d get an upgrade from the old Revenge to the new Revenge at no additional cost, I find out I’ve lost all of my remaining bookings for this month. If this keeps up much longer, I might as well close down the business.”
“Well, it’s not like they’re getting anything done about the oil leak,” Honey said. “It’s been two weeks since they first discovered the wellhead was leaking and it seems like each time you hear a news report the estimate of how much oil is leaking keeps growing.”
“What scares the shit out of me,” Reb said, “is that you’ve got to know the political extremists are going to want to take advantage of the situation. What was it some asshole said? Something about not letting a good crisis go to waste? It wouldn’t surprise me if they shut down all offshore drilling, resulting in the cost of gasoline skyrocketing, and the economy just goes from the sorry state it’s already in to even worse. Damned if I’m not getting depressed just thinking about it.”
Honey stood up, winked at Reb, and said, “I know just the thing to take your mind off your troubles, big boy.”
Reb jumped up from the patio table and said, “You don’t have to ask me twice.”
Honey shrieked in glee and took off running for the bedroom with Reb in hot pursuit.
They spent the next hour frolicking in the bed making love.
Afterwards, they went back out on the balcony.
“Reb, have you given any thought about what you’ll do if the oil spill isn’t taken care of anytime soon and you can’t resume your charter fishing business this season?”
“Not really. I guess I could call General Davidson and work out something there, but I’m not sure that’s what I want to do at this time,” Reb answered.
“Well, I have a proposition for you,” Honey said.
“Great, there’s nothing I like more than being propositioned by a beautiful woman.”
“In that case, you’ll love my idea,” Honey said.
“Which is?”
“On the way to the airport, Sarah got a call from one of my clients wanting me to do a swim suit shoot on the beaches in Miami. Why don’t you take me to Miami on that new boat of yours and we’ll make it a vacation?”
“Sweetheart, that sounds like a great idea,” Reb said.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Thanks for reading Reb’s Rampage, the second book in the Reb Rogers thriller series. I hope you enjoyed reading the book as much as I enjoyed writing it.
By the way, would you like to be notified when the next book in the series (Reb’s Retaliation is the current working title) will be available? You can sign up for my newsletter at this link: http://jbblackauthor.com/contact/
Before you go, I have a request to make. If you enjoyed reading Reb’s Rampage, would you please tell all of your friends about the Reb Rogers thriller series and then take just a moment to write a quick review so other readers will consider giving the Reb Rogers thriller series a shot?
Thank you for your patronage.
J B Black