The foredeck was crowded with stargazers.
“Over here, Jesse,” I heard Chyrel call out. “We’re watching the Perseids.”
She was sitting on the long sun pad with Tank and Bud, two empty spots between them and Charity. We sat down and I stretched my legs out, gazing up at the night sky.
The Milky Way, a dense band of stars making up the galaxy our own sun was a part of, stretched from horizon to horizon.
Every year, the Perseid meteor shower dazzled viewers with up to twenty “shooting stars” per hour during peak activity. It had reached that a week earlier, but there were still the occasional streaks of light across the sky as small rocks burned to dust in Earth’s atmosphere.
“Even better than out in the desert,” Tank whispered. “It really makes a person feel so tiny and inconsequential.”
“The things we do and say don’t matter,” Charity agreed. “Not in the big picture, anyway.”
I took Savannah’s hand and squeezed it. A meteor shot across the sky and there was a collective gasp from those on deck.
“Do you know,” Tank whispered, his voice soft and reverent, “the light from most of those stars is older than mankind? Some are so far away, the light takes hundreds of thousands of years just to reach our eyes. Looking at the night sky is looking back in time.”
My friend Rusty talked about this quite often. He called the stars timeless and predictable and could go on for hours behind the bar about how early mariners were able to use the stars to guide their ships. Today, we used artificial stars, little tin boxes in geostationary orbit, stuffed with electronic gizmos that relayed telephone calls, emails, television, radio, or just their location. GPS receivers picked up these signals from various satellites and computed azimuth and direction to determine their location.
But Rusty had learned to read the stars using a sextant and was amazingly accurate. Of course, he relied on the digital time on his cellphone to determine where a star should be.
“What’s the plan for tomorrow, Jesse?” Charity asked, interrupting my thoughts.
“We’ll explore the dunes,” I replied quietly. “I’ll order both tenders launched to take the crew ashore, along with anything else that floats.”
“The helo can carry me plus nine passengers,” she offered. “I can make two runs before the first launch reaches shore.”
“We’ll be on the first run,” I said. “To make sure the coast is clear.”
“What time do you want to start?”
“First light,” I replied. “The six of us, the boys, and the dogs.”
“I’ll be in the left seat,” Travis’s gravelly voice announced from the side deck.
Bud turned his head and looked up at him. “You’re a chopper pilot?”
“No,” he replied. “But nobody goes ashore without security.”
“Then you’ll ride in back,” Bud said. “I’ll have the copilot’s seat.”
“Pull up some deck, Travis,” I said. “Take some time and contemplate the meaning of life.”
He glanced up at the stars a moment, then back at us. “I know the meaning of life,” he announced. “Protecting it is my job.”
He turned and went back along the side deck. I heard his footfalls on the steps going up to the bridge.
“Officers always got a stick up their ass,” Tank said, then turned to the ponytailed CIA spook seated next to his wife. “Present company excepted.”
“There was a time I was just like that,” Bud said. “The Nam cured me of it. What’s his story?”
“Retired colonel,” I replied. “Ranger and special forces. Then assistant deputy director at Homeland Security.”
“Wait, what? Travis? His last name Stockwell?”
“One and the same,” I replied.
Bud looked over his shoulder toward the darkened windows of the bridge. “And now he’s working security on a research boat?”
“A little more than that,” I said. “Stockwell’s the head of security for all of Armstrong Research, overseeing more than fifty operatives in the field and twice that at Armstrong’s many operations and command and control centers around the globe.”
“So, this is where he disappeared to,” Bud said, almost cryptically.
I stared at his profile for a moment, but he said nothing else.
A steady easterly wind held Ambrosia pointing to windward and a calm sea gently moved her. It was still early in the evening, a waxing gibbous moon was on the rise, and with every tick of the clock, it was stealing the night sky from the stars. There were a few puffy clouds floating to the south, illuminated by the moon. Aside from them, the sky was clear, and the moon and the stars shone brightly on the sea.
We all chatted for an hour, watching the meteors radiate out from the constellation Perseus. Savannah leaned against my shoulder. I looked down and saw her trying to stifle a yawn.
“We’d better turn in,” I said, noticing that others were beginning to retreat to their quarters for the night.
“Been a long day,” Tank said in agreement.
Without aid, he rose and extended a hand to Chyrel. She took it and stood next to him, not letting go. “We’ll see all y’all in the morning,” she said.
“That’s Southernese for ‘all you nice folk,’” Tank said to Bud, grinning in the moonlight.
I rose and helped Savannah up.
“Is someone on watch tonight?” Charity asked, remaining seated.
As Val passed by, headed to the side deck, she replied, “Yes, Mr. Stockwell has the conn and Axel will relieve him at oh-three-hundred.”
“Then I’ll stay here for a bit,” she said, looking up and back toward the darkened windows of the bridge. “Work on my moontan.”
I woke early to the smell emanating from the coffee maker. Savannah had set it up before we’d gone to bed. Pulling back the covers, I rose naked and went to my dresser, picking up our clothes, which were strewn haphazardly across the small room.
I tossed everything in a laundry basket beside the dresser, put on clean skivvies, and made my way to the little galley area of our quarters. There, I poured two mugs of coffee, and returned to find Savannah leaning over the bed, pulling the sheets up.
“Hold that pose,” I whispered.
“You just get that notion right out of your head,” she said without looking back. “You’re too old to survive a second round.”
She wasn’t far off the mark. Savannah had always been a wild and passionate woman in bed. Our lovemaking the night before had left me completely drained.
I leaned against the dresser. “Doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy the view. Want some coffee?”
She turned and tossed her golden hair over a tanned shoulder, standing before me in all her glory. Savannah wasn’t bashful about her body, as some women might be. Though she’d turned fifty just over a month earlier, she could hold her own with any beach bunny.
“Thank you,” she said, taking the cup and setting it on the dresser.
She hugged me tightly, her bare breasts warm against my chest. I could feel a stirring in my shorts, and she felt it too, reaching down to stroke me slowly.
Once she had me fully aroused, she smiled up at me, then picked up her mug. “That should keep you at attention until tonight.”
She pushed me aside and opened the top drawer, selecting her clothes for the day. She stepped into a yellow bikini bottom, adjusting it with her back to me, fully aware of what she was doing.
“Get dressed,” she said, glancing over her shoulder and catching me looking at her butt. “The boys will be up soon.”
“The boys are already up,” I said, smacking her lightly on a bare butt cheek.
A few minutes later, we emerged from our bedroom and found Alberto and Fernando sitting at the little table, munching loudly on breakfast cereal.
“Are we going to the beach?” Alberto asked, as they both turned to look at us. His voice became concerned as he looked a
t my face. “You don’t look so good. Are you okay?”
Savannah took my empty mug from my hands. “He just hasn’t had enough,” she said with a lascivious grin, refilling my mug.
Alberto turned to his friend. “No es humano hasta que bebe su jugo de vida.”
“Qué es el jugo de vida?”
“Café,” Alberto replied, and they both giggled.
“No es verdad,” I said to Fernando. “I can be very human before having my lifer juice.”
“He’s right,” Savannah said, stretching on bare toes to kiss me on the cheek. “He can often be alert and invigorated before his coffee.”
The two boys giggled again and went back to their cereal.
“You’re a vixen,” I whispered in her ear.
“Want some breakfast?”
Without waiting for a reply, she opened the fridge and took a carton of eggs out, along with a tube of sausage.
I sat down with the boys while she fried the sausage, then scrambled a half dozen eggs in the grease.
As we were finishing, I heard footsteps from above.
“That’s probably Charity,” I said, looking at my watch. “It’s a half hour till sunup; she’s probably doing her preflight.”
“Go on up,” Savannah said. “We’ll catch up after the boys help me with the dishes.”
When I climbed to the fly bridge, I spotted Charity in the gathering morning light. She had her hair in a ponytail hanging out of the hole in the back of her ball cap. As usual, she was dressed in her tight-fitting black flight suit, a pair of reflector shades hanging from a pocket. She was on a ladder, inspecting the twin turbine engines.
“Everything okay?” I asked, crossing the helipad.
“Yeah,” she said. But her voice seemed on edge—kind of cutting.
I looked up at her. “Something’s wrong.”
She looked down at me, her features masking any emotion. I’d seen that look before. Charity was an extraordinarily complex woman. She’d survived being captured and tortured by the Taliban in the early days of the war. I knew she’d been repeatedly raped during that time, as well. The memory of such an ordeal would be too much for most people. But she managed to bury it deep in her subconscious mind, a place filled with vile and hateful emotions. She could call on it when needed, changing from a happy-go-lucky California girl to an intense warrior like flicking a switch to turn on a lamp. There was no slow burn in Charity Styles, just on and off. She and I had discussed our demons openly with one another many years ago.
That was the look I saw in her eyes at that moment—demonic.
“I have a mission,” she finally answered. Then her face changed, and she smiled. “But I don’t have to leave for four days, when I get back to Grenada.”
Normally, Armstrong’s operatives didn’t talk about their assignments, not even to one another. Only when they needed help or intel did they contact the guys working in the op center. But Charity and I had a different relationship.
“What’s the assignment?” I asked, knowing that was what must have triggered her.
“Observation only,” she replied, putting the engine access cover back in place. “Some rich turd fondlers who like little girls.”
Inwardly, I grinned at the use of the phrase. It was a favorite of mine, not often used in public.
“And you’re only going to be watching them?” I asked.
“One in particular,” she said, climbing down. “No danger. The girls these guys are into are almost thirty years younger than me.”
Charity had celebrated her fortieth birthday with us in Belize over a year ago. She was talking about a group of child molesters, something I knew she had a more-than-vehement opposition to. I wasn’t worried about her safety encountering men like that. I was more worried she’d snap and kill them. Not that they wouldn’t deserve it, but it could blow her cover.
“Where?” I asked.
“The Virgin Islands, of all places.”
She folded the aluminum ladder and strapped it to the side rail where it was stored.
My responsibility, as Ambrosia’s captain, was to the ship and her crew. I wasn’t privy to the missions Armstrong’s field operators were assigned, though many of them were my friends. But I had to wonder about assigning Charity a mission where the situation might unexpectedly dredge up those suppressed memories.
I pulled open the door on the pilot’s side. “Who assigned you?”
She didn’t answer until she’d climbed in. “No need to worry, Jesse. I got this.”
She flipped on the batteries. The dash and interior lights came on and the few analog gauges on the dash flicked. Removing a laminated sheet, she started going through the preflight instructions. In her own bird, she didn’t need a card. Hers was a UH-1 Iroquois, commonly referred to as a Huey. She’d flown a Huey at the age most girls were just getting a learner’s permit to drive a car. Her father had used helos in his crop- dusting business, and she’d started flying at an early age, spraying the fields of the San Fernando Valley. After 9/11, she’d accepted a commission in the Army and flew Hueys as a search and rescue pilot.
Finn and Woden appeared at the top of the ladder, with Savannah and the boys right behind them. The boys were talking excitedly in Spanish as Giselle and Ricardo brought up the rear of the small entourage.
“Did you call Chyrel?” I asked Savannah as they joined me beside the bird. “Charity’s gonna be ready soon.”
“They’re on the way,” she replied.
Stockwell appeared, wearing shorts, sandals, and a goofy-looking fruit juicy shirt. The contrast between his tropical tourist clothes and face was huge. His tropical attire screamed tourist. But one look at his face would make even the drunkest partygoer on Duval Street step into the road to let him by. The shirt hung loose over his cargo shorts, and I knew he had a holstered handgun under it.
I did too.
“Before you utter a word,” he cautioned, “I’m just trying to make the crew feel comfortable. I know a few don’t like me and my team being armed all the time.”
“I wasn’t going to say anything,” I said.
“Sure, you weren’t,” he grumbled, then walked around to the left side of the bird, opened the copilot’s door, and climbed in.
So much for Bud riding shotgun, I thought.
Looking east, I saw the sun peeking over the horizon. Savannah joined me.
“It looks like it’s going to be a beautiful day,” she said, holding my upper arm in her hands. “Please try to enjoy it.”
“We’re about ready,” Charity called out.
I helped the others aboard as I spotted Chyrel and Tank approaching. Bud was a few steps ahead of them.
“Get in back,” Travis ordered the CIA man.
He started to protest, but I shook my head, and he kept his mouth shut.
Aside from Charity, everyone was dressed for a day at the beach, carrying bags with towels and sunscreen.
Ricardo got his son strapped in behind Charity, then leaned in toward her. “He has never flown before.”
She smiled at him. “You have nothing to worry about. He’ll be as safe in my charge as he is on the boat.”
Giselle kissed Fernando on the cheek, admonishing him to do what he was told. “We will be on the first boat,” she promised.
“We’ll keep a close eye on him,” I said to Ricardo. “He’ll be fine. Charity’s one of the top helo pilots the Army ever had.”
The couple retreated to the flybridge and with everyone aboard, including the dogs, I climbed in and closed the door, settling into my seat.
“Hinlegen,” Savannah ordered Woden.
As one, the two dogs dropped to the floor of the helo right in front of the two boys.
Ricardo turned toward Alberto and asked, “Que esta hinlegen?”
“Es Alemán. Creo que significa acostarse.”
“That’s right,” Savannah said. “It’s German for ‘lie down.’�
�
Charity donned her headset and opened a vent window. “Clear,” she shouted needlessly. There were only four others on the deck, all directly ahead of us. But Charity was a stickler when it came to flight procedures.
Tank opened his armrest, took out a compact pair of headphones, and showed the boys how to plug them into a receptacle in front of the armrest.
The rest of us did the same, donning the headsets so we could talk and be heard over the sound of the rotors and engine noise.
The turbines began to spool up, the whirring pitch getting higher and higher as the rotors turned. When it reached speed, Charity flipped on the fuel pump, then pressed the ignitor, and the turbines roared to life. She nodded at the crewmen standing with Ricardo and Giselle, and the two men raced forward, bent low. They quickly undid the tiedowns and retreated.
Charity twisted the throttle, bringing the turbines up to speed, then raised the collective slightly as she pulled back on the cyclic. The bird rose off the deck, nose high as it moved backward off the helipad.
Moving the stick forward and to the right, she dipped the nose toward the water, and we flew out over the wave tops, heading toward shore.
Fernando stared out the window, waving to his parents. Then he turned to Alberto, and I heard him ask over the intercom, “Cuánto tiempo antes de que lleguemos?”
“About five minutes,” I told them both, raising a hand showing all five digits.
“Thank you,” Fernando said. “This is…” He looked at Alberto again. “Excitante?”
I laughed, remembering my first ride in a helicopter more than forty years earlier. I’d jumped out of that one.
“Exciting,” I said. “Yes, it is.”
The nose remained down, and Charity added more power. Soon, we were skimming across the water at what I guessed to be close to 150 knots.
Before reaching shore, Charity pulled up, gaining altitude to have a look around, but not high enough to appear on any radar system on shore—just a few hundred feet above the water.
Travis scanned the area through a powerful pair of binoculars. “I don’t see anything.”
“Roger that,” Charity said, bringing the nose down again as she reduced power. She flared as we crossed over the beach, turned into the wind, and brought us down gently on a high dune.
Steady As She Goes: A Jesse McDermitt Novel (Caribbean Adventure Series Book 21) Page 13