by Dave Barry
He stared at the phone, trying to decide what to do next. Above him, on the TV set, the NewsPlex Nine co-anchors were looking excited.
“. . . first piece of good news in a while,” the female was saying. She looked at the male.
“That’s right,” he said. “We have received word that NewsPlex Nine reporter Summer Westfall and cameraman Javier Santiago have both survived the crash of the NewsPlex Nine NewsVan that we reported just minutes ago.” He looked at the female anchor.
“According to police radio reports,” she said, “Summer and Javier were injured, and are being placed aboard an ambulance now.”
“We have no word yet on the seriousness of their injuries,” said the male, “but we will, of course, be following this breaking story closely.”
“Our prayers are with these two courageous members of the NewsPlex Nine family,” said the female, her eyes moistening.
“We’ve been through a lot tonight here at NewsPlex Nine,” said the male anchor, “and if it’s not too unprofessional, I think this good news is a good reason for a good old-fashioned hug.”
He turned to the female anchor, and she to him, and they held each other in an embrace—an embrace that, to the anchors’ spouses, watching from their respective homes, seemed to last just a tad too long.
BREATHE THROUGH YOUR NOSE.
In the transom of Tark’s boat, Frank fought yet another wave of nausea brought on by swallowing his own blood. He was worried that if he vomited, he’d choke to death, his mouth sealed tight by the layers of duct tape.
Frank was aware that the boat was tied up to the stern of the Extravaganza. He figured, from the number of shots Tark and Kaz had fired, that the ship crew had been taken out. He’d seen Tark and Kaz leave the boat, and then Rebar and Holman, so he knew for now he was alone on the boat. He could hear Tark’s voice—the sea and wind were calmer here in the shelter of the big ship—but he couldn’t make out the words.
Frank figured now was his best, probably only, chance to do anything about his situation. If he could get his hands in front of him, now bound tightly by the wrists behind him, he could get the duct tape off his mouth, maybe find something to use as a weapon. He knew some people could do this, were limber enough to get their arms down around their legs and feet and then up in front. But he didn’t know if he was one of those people. He was a big, stocky guy, and his arms weren’t particularly long. But this was his only chance, so he rolled to his side and began working his hands down his back, and right away he could feel how tight it was—this isn’t gonna work, you can’t do this—but he forced himself to keep trying because this was all he could think of and if he didn’t get this tape off soon he was fucked.
Swallow. Breathe.
FAY, COMING FAST THROUGH THE DOOR FROM the portside deck, ran directly into Wally, who was on his way outside for one last, desperate attempt to have a non-moronic conversation with her or, failing that, to hurl himself into the sea.
“Umfh,” she said.
“Sorry,” he said. “Look, that thing about Leonardo DiCaprio, I was just . . .”
“Shut up,” she said. “Do you know where the bridge is?”
“The what?”
“The bridge. The bridge. Where the captain steers the ship.”
“Oh yeah,” said Wally, wanting to punch himself in the face for forgetting what a bridge was. “It’s up these stairs behind where we, OK, there’s actually two sets of stairs, but you . . .”
Fay grabbed his arms. “Show me where it is,” she said.
“Is something wrong?”
“Just take me there right now, OK?”
“OK,” said Wally, turning toward the stairs to the third deck, clueless about what was going on, but happy that, for whatever reason, she was actually choosing to remain, however briefly, in his company.
Thirteen
TO REACH THE BRIDGE OF THE EXTRAVAGANZA OF the Seas, you entered a small hallway at the forward end of the big third-deck salon, the one where the band played. You then climbed a narrow stairway. The bottom of the stairway was guarded by a heavy steel door that said NO ADMITTANCE AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY and had an electronic lock with a keypad that required a five-digit code. The door had been installed to prevent hijackings, but First Officer Hank Wilde could never remember the damn code, especially after he’d been drinking, so it was his custom to start each trip by tying the door open with a piece of rope.
And so it was open now as Captain Eddie Smith stood at the bridge, keeping the ship pointed into the wind and drifting with the Gulf Stream, waiting for Manny Arquero to get on the two-way radio and tell him the transfer was complete. He looked at his watch. Should be any minute now. His mind was on getting back to Miami now, back to his wife and little boy.
He glanced at the small TV mounted in the control console. On the screen, the male and the female anchors were both looking close to tears; in the upper-right-hand corner the red letters spelled TRAGEDY STRIKES NEWSPLEX NINE AGAIN. Eddie turned the volume up slightly.
“. . . incredible turn of events,” the male anchor was saying. “We are now getting word that the ambulance carrying NewsPlex Nine reporter Summer Westfall and cameraman Javier Santiago from the scene of the NewsVan Nine crash in the Westchester area has itself been involved in an accident.” He looked at the female anchor.
“What makes this all the more unbelievable,” she said, “is that, from what we are hearing on the police radio, the ambulance apparently collided head-on with a second NewsPlex Nine van, on its way to the scene, carrying NewsPlex Nine reporter Carlosina Verdad and cameraman Doug Pilcher.” She looked at the male.
“We are still awaiting word on whether there have been any injuries, or I guess I should say additional injuries,” he said.
“Meanwhile,” the female said, “our thoughts and prayers go out to Carlosina, and Doug, and Summer, and . . . and Summer’s cameraman . . .”
“Javier,” said the male.
“Yes, of course, Javier, as well as the other members of the NewsPlex Nine family who have been victims of this devastating killer storm, Hector, which has already tragically claimed the lives of . . .”
“HEY! ANYBODY HERE?”
Eddie shut off the TV, shouted down the stairway, “Who is it?”
“It’s Ted and Johnny,” Ted shouted back.
“Who?” said Eddie.
“Ted and Johnny,” said Ted, now clumping up the stairs, Johnny right behind him. “We’re in the band.”
“You’re not supposed to be up here,” said Eddie.
“I know, but something bad happened,” said Ted.
“You gotta call the cops,” said Johnny. “They’re shooting back there.”
“What?” said Eddie. “Where?”
“In the back of the ship,” said Ted. “The shell shot whatshisname, Manny, and then these . . .”
“Manny’s been shot?” said Eddie. “You sure?”
“We saw it,” said Johnny, nodding violently. “The shell shot him.”
“The what?”
“The shell,” said Ted. “The guy in the shell shoot. I mean shell suit. He shot Manny, and then these guys on the boat started shooting everybody, and then they came on the boat.”
“They came on the ship?” said Eddie. “They’re on the ship now?”
“Yes,” said Johnny, nodding even harder. “With guns.”
“You got to call the cops,” said Ted. “Or the Coast Guard.”
Eddie turned and stared at the ship’s radio, thinking fast. If there was shooting, he needed help out here. But if he called the Coast Guard, they’d find the drugs, the money, whatever it was they were transferring, and there would be no way they wouldn’t believe Eddie was involved, and he’d be on his way back to prison, this time basically forever. He’d never spend another night with his wife, another day with his boy. Never.
“Come on, man,” said Ted. “They’re killing people back there.”
“They’re on the ship,” said Johnny.<
br />
They were on the ship. They were on Eddie’s ship.
“OK,” said Eddie, and he reached for the microphone to call the Coast Guard. He’d have to figure out some way out of this later. Maybe, if there was enough confusion when he got the ship back to Miami, he’d be able to disappear. Back to the Bahamas, maybe. He could contact Luz somehow, try to explain the situation, why he wasn’t coming home. But right now, he had to get the Coast Guard out here, because this was his ship. He picked up the microphone, and then he heard a new voice on the bridge.
“Hold it, Captain,” said Kaz.
LOU TARANT SKIDDED TO A STOP IN FRONT OF the Chum Bucket in his 2002 Mercedes CL-600 coupe, which had a 362-horsepower V-12 engine. It retailed for over $100,000, but Tarant had been able to get it for free, in exchange for not killing the Mercedes dealer’s son, who had a gambling problem.
Tarant jumped out of the car without bothering to shut off the engine, knowing that there would be a flunky waiting there to park the car, which there was. As Tarant strode toward the door, he was met by Gene Shroder, who’d arrived a few minutes earlier.
“You reach the ship?” Tarant asked.
“Lou, they don’t answer.”
“What?”
“We’re trying, but they’re not answering.”
“Fuck,” said Tarant.
“Yeah,” said Shroder.
“Is Stu’s boat ready?”
“He gassed it up, Lou, but he says they need to unload the . . .”
“Is the Wookie here? And the crew?”
“They’re all here, Lou. But Stu says before you go he should . . .”
“Tell Stu we’re leaving now.”
“OK, Lou.”
JOCK EMERGED FROM THE KITCHEN, ONE ARM around Connie, the grieving divorcée, the other tucking his shirt back into his pants. He expected to find his bandmates tuning up, getting ready to start the next set, but the only person on the far end of the room was Strom Thurmond, on his feet again, dancing to whatever music he was hearing.
Jock turned to Emeril, perched on his stool, and said, “You seen the band around?”
Emeril glared straight ahead.
“Thanks,” said Jock.
“What time’re you supposed to start playing again?” said Connie.
Jock looked at his watch. “About ten minutes ago. I thought they’d be pissed at me for taking this long.”
“So where are they?”
“My guess?” said Jock. He held an imaginary joint to his lips and took an imaginary hit.
“So you got a few more minutes,” said Connie.
“Looks like,” he said.
“This time I’m on top,” she said, pulling him back into the kitchen.
AT THE STERN PLATFORM, TARK WAS PLEASED by how smoothly things were going.
He’d started by creating a crime scene, sticking TEC-9s in the hands of two of the dead crewmen, to make it look as though they’d been shooting. Next, he and Rebar, holding their breaths against the puke stench, had gone into the forward compartment of his boat and hauled out some parts of a Zodiac inflatable boat—a broken piece of fiberglass deck, some pontoon tubing, and some rope. Tark had made these himself by wrecking a Zodiac he’d stolen back in the Bahamas. He and Rebar had tangled the rope up with two Extravaganza life vests, then tossed everything into the water, making a nice little piece of easily identifiable wreckage for the Coast Guard to find.
Then they’d hauled the body of Bobby Kemp, his pink costume now punctured by bullet holes, onto the fishing boat, and put his gun—the one he’d used to shoot Manny Arquero—back into his pink hand. Tark had checked on Frank; he’d moved some, obviously been struggling, but he was still hogtied and gagged tight. He groaned when Tark kicked him in the back, so he was still alive; Tark would have liked to mess with him some more, but he had a lot to do, so he decided to let it go.
Tark had leaned over and whispered his farewell in Frank’s ear.
“You’re a lucky man, Chief,” he’d said. “If you can keep from choking long enough, you get to drown.”
Then came the hardest part for Tark, at least emotionally: hauling two duffel bags full of cash—man, those things were heavy—across the platform and heaving them into the fishing boat. Tark truly hated to part with what he knew was more money than he had made in his whole life until now, but he also knew it had to look real to the Coast Guard and Tarant. He’d also put two duffel bags of product on his boat—one cocaine, one marijuana. The rest of the shipment he’d left stashed back in the Bahamas.
Next, Tark and Rebar had launched the Extravaganza’s Zodiac dinghy. It took some effort, as it was a heavy boat, for an inflatable; fortunately, the davits had power winches. They got it into the water, then dragged it over and tied it to the stern platform. Tark tried the engine, which started right away; it had plenty of gas, though Tark had brought an extra can, just in case.
He’d thought of everything, Tark had. No surprise there: He’d been planning it for almost two years, working it out piece by piece, detail by detail—how he could stop being just a delivery boy for a lousy ten grand a trip; how he could, one time, keep all this money, and all this product, for himself, and be rich forever.
His big break had come when Bobby Kemp had bought the Extravaganza, Bobby being the perfect combination of greedy, confident, and stupid. When Kemp had approached Tark, felt him out about hijacking a shipment, it was like God or somebody saying, OK, Tark, here you go.
Tark had played clueless, asking a lot of questions, getting Kemp to feed him information about the ship, the security procedures, the personnel. Then, slowly, he started leading Kemp on, using his questions to feed ideas to Kemp a little at a time. Kemp ate it up, especially the part about Kemp shooting Manny Arquero. He hated that guy. In the end, Kemp bought Tark’s plan, the whole thing, thinking it was all his idea, like he was a brilliant criminal mastermind and Tark was just some dumbass boat jockey who’d be thrilled to get a whole million dollars. A million dollars. Shit, that’s basically what Tark was gonna throw away out here, leaving it on the boat with the criminal mastermind, in his pink shell suit.
Tark checked his watch. Kaz and Holman had disabled the Extravaganza radios by now. They’d also set up the cell-phone jammer—the thing in the metal case—on top of the ship, where it would have maximum range. Tark had bought it on the Internet and tested it in the Bahamas. Nobody on the ship could make or receive calls until the jammer’s battery died, which wouldn’t be for another four hours. There was no way for anybody on the ship to sound the alarm.
There’d also be no way for the ship to get back to Miami, at least for a while. Any second now, Kaz and Holman would put the Extravaganza on autopilot, heading north and east, farther off the coast, at a sedate five knots or so. They’d make sure the captain knew Bobby Kemp was behind all this, then leave him bound and gagged on the floor. They’d leave the bridge door locked behind them; besides the captain, the only people who knew the code were Manny Arquero and Hank Wilde, both dead. So by the time anybody in Miami realized that the Extravaganza was late coming back, it would be far away, and heading farther, totally out of contact. Search and Rescue would go out, but they’d be looking for a big ship, not Tark in his Zodiac. By the time they found the Extravaganza, he’d be back in the Bahamas, with nobody even looking for him.
All that remained now was for him and Rebar to load the rest of the cash into the Zodiac; Kaz and Holman would be down to help soon. In maybe ten minutes, they’d be done. It was a lot of weight for the Zodiac; it would ride low, which meant a wet trip home in these seas. But Tark had no doubt he’d make it. Especially since he’d be going back alone, just him and his money. Because once the boat was loaded, he really didn’t need these other assholes.
Fourteen
“PUT THE MICROPHONE BACK, CAPTAIN,” SAID KAZ.
Eddie put the microphone back.
“Oh man,” said Johnny. “It’s the guy from the other boat who . . .”
“Shut up
, asshole,” said Kaz.
“OK,” said Johnny.
Kaz pondered the situation. There weren’t supposed to be extra people here. There was just supposed to be the captain. That was how Tark had explained the plan. Disable the radios, put the ship on autopilot, tell the captain this was Bobby Kemp’s operation so he’d repeat it to the Coast Guard, tie him up, close the door, get the hell back to the stern. That was the plan.
But now Kaz had these two extra assholes on his hands. He wished Holman would hurry up and get here. Holman had gone up to the top deck, outside. He was supposed to secure the cell-phone jammer in a good spot, where nobody would see it, and where it would have maximum range.
Kaz decided he’d wait and consult with Holman on what to do about the extra assholes. So for the moment, the four of them just stood there on the bridge; Kaz watching Eddie, Johnny, and Ted; them watching him, this big guy with the big gun, smelling of . . . was that vomit?
The silence on the bridge lasted a long 45 seconds, ending with the sound of footsteps on the stairs. Relieved, Kaz turned toward the stairwell. His relief turned to concern when two heads appeared at the top of the stairs and neither one was Holman’s.
“UH-oh,” said Wally.
“Oh, shit,” said Fay, recognizing Kaz.
“Get over there and shut up,” said Kaz, motioning with his gun for Wally and Fay to go stand by the helm with the other three. Kaz was not liking this. Now he had four extra assholes to worry about. Where the hell was Holman?
As he pondered, Kaz heard new arrivals in the stairwell. Kaz, pointing his gun at his captives, lifted a finger to his lips. Voices came up the stairway.
“More steps?” said Arnie. “How many steps they got in this boat?”
“We’re almost there,” said Mara.
“I’m almost dead,” said Phil.