Gold in the Keys

by Matthew Rief

  Before hitting the sack, we set all of our equipment aside including the masks, fins, dive knives, snorkels, flashlights, and small cans of Spare Air. Scott gave the okay on the rebreathers, saying that they looked to be in perfect order, and we both tested the sea scooters and made sure that they were both fully charged. We knew we wouldn’t have much time in the morning to prepare, so we did everything we could the night before. In my experience, when it comes to warfare, there’s no such thing as overpreparation. Planning out and being ready for the worst had saved my life countless times, and it was a habit I couldn’t shake even if I wanted to.

  It was just past eleven when I turned off the cockpit lights and turned on the security system. We didn’t know when we’d leave in the morning, but we knew it would probably be before sunrise. Despite wanting to get as much sleep as we could, we decided it was best that we station a lookout just in case Black Venom tried anything in the middle of the night. I took the first one from twenty-three thirty until zero one thirty while Jack and Scott hit the sack in the Baia’s two guest beds. I brewed some coffee and sat on the sunbed with my Sig in hand, watching the goings-on at the marina. Gus had most of the dock lights shut off at twenty-one hundred every night, so I used my night vision monocular to scan up and down the docks and look over the parking lot. By midnight, it was quiet enough that all I could hear was the slow shifting of the docks and the ripples from the occasional fish snacking on bugs.

  At 0120 I heard footsteps coming from inside the Baia, then watched as the door swung open and Scott appeared, holding a mug of steaming liquid in one hand and his Glock in the other. He looked like he’d been up for hours, showing no signs of grogginess—a trait that forms after spending years doing what we did while in the SEALs on little or no sleep. He stood beside the sunbed and took a long look around before taking a sip of his coffee.

  “All quiet on the western front,” I said.

  He nodded and sat down beside me, and we spent a few minutes talking about the following morning before he finally got me to stand up and turn in for the night.

  “Looks like there’s a storm blowing in,” he said, motioning towards the sky above the open ocean over the port side of the boat. The sky was darker in some parts than in others, indicating patches of rolling clouds.

  “Good thing you don’t believe in omens,” I said.

  “Right.”

  “Here,” I said, handing him the night vision monocular. “I’ll see you bright and early in the morning.”

  I stepped down into the lounge, shutting the door behind me, then made my way into the main cabin. Setting my Sig and cell phone on the nightstand beside me, I sprawled out on the bed and fell instantly asleep.

  CHAPTER

  EIGHTEEN

  I woke up the following morning to the sound of my phone, and tilting the screen towards me, I saw that I’d received a message from Angelina. She informed me that Black Venom had a yacht, a large salvage vessel and three smaller boats on the move out of a private marina on Stock Island, just north of Key West. She wrote that they had left at zero four hundred and were making wake for the ledge. Looking at my watch, I saw that it was almost zero five hundred, which meant that their small fleet would be reaching Neptune’s Table soon.

  Crawling out of bed, I stepped into the lounge and heard the unmistakable sounds of raindrops splashing on the topside of the Baia. I grabbed a rain slicker from the closet, slid it over my shirt and zipped it up before stepping out into the cockpit. Jack was hunkered down on one of the white-cushioned seats, his body hunched back and his eyes gazing out over the marina. He held a Navy coffee mug in one hand and his compact Desert Eagle in the other.

  “Storm’s gonna get worse,” he said as he looked over at me. “Gonna be hell out there on the water all day.”

  “Did you see anything?”

  He shook his head, then set the mug on a cork coaster resting on the table. I looked out over the marina, watching the rain fall and looking up at the black clouds swarming overhead. The wind had picked up. It blew in gusts and rattled deck lines and flapped the loose sails of the catamaran moored beside us.

  “It’s time to go,” I said before turning and heading back down into the lounge.

  Scott was already up and filling his mug with coffee when I entered the lounge. I told both him and Jack what Angelina had said in her message, and we made quick preparations to get the Baia underway. I started up the engine while Jack untied the ropes, disconnected the shore power cables and removed and capped the water lines. The rain picked up as we cruised out of the marina toward the open ocean and towards the heart of the dark clouds above. When we were about to reach the end of the no-wake zone, I noticed an unusually large buoy floating directly in front of us. It was white, and as I motored closer to it, I saw that there were black letters painted on the side of it.

  “What the hell is that?” Scott said, peering through the rain-splattered windscreen. He grabbed the pair of binoculars from the small locker beside the console and looked through.

  “You’re not allowed to drop pots here,” Jack said. “Must be a mainlander.”

  Scott shook his head, then eased the binoculars down to his side. “I don’t think it’s a crab pot.” He looked at me gravely and handed me the binoculars. I eased back on the throttles as we got within a few hundred feet of the buoy, then looked through. Written clearly on the side of the white buoy in what looked like black spray paint was a name. My name. I stared at it in awe for a moment, wondering what it could mean. Then I noticed something metallic in the water below it.

  “Take the wheel, will you, Jack?” I said. He grabbed it with one hand, and I stepped around the cockpit, climbing up onto the bow. “Ease her beside the buoy.”

  Jack brought the bow right up to the buoy and I looked over the starboard side, into the water below. The heavy rain and the choppy surface made it difficult to see, but I could tell that there was something down there. I looked up and saw that Scott had climbed up onto the bow and was looking down as well.

  “Toss me a mask,” I said while I unzipped and slid off my rain slicker. I dropped it in the cockpit, and Jack threw me a clear Cressi dive mask. I pulled off my tee shirt, strapped the mask over my eyes and nose, then hurled my body over the side, splashing into the water headfirst. As soon as I broke through the surface, I saw the body of a man anchored to the bottom by a metal chain. I dove down a few strokes and, upon seeing the man’s face clearly, realized that it was Daniel. I didn’t know how long he’d been there, but judging from the condition of his body, it hadn’t been more than a couple of hours. The chains were shackled around his ankles so tight that there was no way I’d be getting them loose. I let out a little air and kicked for the surface. Rain and choppy water returned as I broke up from under the ocean. Scott was standing at the bow, leaning over the side and staring at me while Jack kept the Baia as steady as possible beside me.

  “What is it?” Scott asked, no doubt noticing the grim look on my face.

  I stroked over to the swim platform, then climbed up onto the deck.

  “You remember that guy from the alley last night? Well, he’s dead now.”

  “The one who told you guys where Black Venom would be this morning?” Jack asked, and I nodded while grabbing a towel and drying off. “Great. So now they know we’re coming.”

  “We’re just gonna have to start even farther away, that’s all,” I said, moving over to the table, opening my laptop and bringing up satellite imagery of the water around Neptune’s Table. Scott stepped down, standing beside me as I continued, “They’ll be on the lookout for us. Hell, they might even have a few of their boats doing tours around them, so we’re gonna have to move quickly.” I looked at the map for a moment, then pointed at the location I knew would be best. “Here.”

  Jack left the engine in neutral and stepped over to the table. “Mooney Harbor Key?” he said, looking down where my finger was pointing. “That’s over six miles from the ledge, bro.”


  “It’s our best bet. You can pull us up to the windward side of the island, using it as cover as we dive into the water, then you can cruise away.”

  “We’ve got at least three hours on the rebreathers, and the sea scooters have an hour of battery charge when operating full speed,” Scott said. “At that speed we should reach the ledge in well under an hour, though.”

  There was a boom of thunder that roared over the surface of the water, followed soon after by a flash of lightning. The rain had picked up even more and was now a full-fledged tropical storm. I stepped back over to the cockpit and gripped the wheel. I set the towel on the seat beside me, then eased the throttle forward.

  “You’re just gonna leave him down there?” Jack said, his eyes wide as he looked at me, then glanced over the side of the boat at the buoy.

  “We have no choice right now,” I replied. “He’s dead, and if we don’t get to that ledge soon, they’re going to kill Sam as well.”

  I didn’t wait for a reply. Since we were now a good two hundred feet clear of the entrance into the marina and the no-wake zone, I pushed the throttles forward, roaring the engines to life and accelerating us like a racing boat over the water. Within a few seconds, I had her up on plane, and even with the small whitecaps on the surface, I was able to keep her steady at thirty knots. The wind howled past the boat and sheets of rain slammed into the windscreen. Looking down at my phone, which was resting in a small dashboard compartment, I saw that I’d received two messages from Angelina. The first said that Black Venom had reached the ledge, and I saw that she’d sent it twelve minutes earlier. The second message said that they believed Sam was being kept on the yacht, based on satellite images they had of its movement. Though with the storm, Angelina said they were only able to get a quick look at the boat before it vanished behind black clouds, so they weren’t a hundred percent certain she was there.

  I took us through the Northwest Channel, around Cottrell Key, then into Boca Grande Channel, keeping north so as to avoid Black Venom and approach them from behind the Marquesas Keys. Forty-five minutes after pulling out of the marina in Key West, I eased the throttles as we approached the eight islands that formed the Marquesas Keys, keeping us on course for Mooney Harbor Key, just south of Marquesas.

  “I got it,” Jack said, taking the wheel. “You guys gear up.”

  Scott and Jack had already brought all the gear we would need out onto the deck. I grabbed the binoculars and took a quick look around. After seeing we were the only ones nearby, I slid into my thin 3mm wet suit and strapped my dive knife around my leg, then secured my holster and Sig around my hip and slipped into my booties. After bringing the black duffle bag that had the bombs inside it over to the swim platform along with my fins, I donned the rebreather gear. Scott handed me a small can of Spare Air along with a waterproof walkie-talkie. I unzipped a small pocket in my rebreather suit and set them both inside right next to the detonator switch. Jack killed the throttles when we were within a few hundred feet from the shore of the Mooney Harbor Key. Looking over the stern of the boat, I could see shallow reefs right beside us.

  “Send a message to Angelina,” I told Jack. “My phone’s on the dash. Let her know when we’re in the water, and tell her we’re approximately forty-five minutes out. Keep your radio close. We’ll call you if we need backup.”

  Jack nodded as he helped Scott with his gear, then checked both of us over, making sure we hadn’t messed anything up when donning and verifying that we were properly weighted. Then he gave us both a thumbs-up, and I spat into my mask, rinsed it out briefly in the water so it wouldn’t fog up and strapped it over my face.

  Turning to Scott, I said, “Ange said they think Sam’s on the yacht. That’s where we’re heading first.”

  We grabbed each other’s forearms and let out a loud hooyah, taking us back to our days in the Navy. Then I returned Jack’s gesture, giving him a thumbs-up, then pumped my fist as I took a big step into the white-capped water. The tropical storm with its heavy rains, roaring thunder and howling winds went silent in an instant as I broke through the surface of the water. I rose back up to the surface for a moment, grabbing hold of the sea scooter Jack handed me along with the black duffle bag, then gave the all good signal with my hand and descended towards the bottom of the ocean. Scott followed closely behind me, and we met up under the bow of the Baia, about fifteen feet down beside a shallow reef. Scott held out a waterproof GPS in front of him and indicated where the ledge was in relation to our current location. I was confident enough in my knowledge of the area around Mooney Harbor Key and the water between it and Neptune’s Table, but was still glad Scott had brought it just in case. It was a beautiful day beneath the waves, with lots of active sea life around us. A manta ray swam gracefully beside us, along with a school of king mackerel, whose silver bodies glistened in the little light bleeding down through the clouds above.

  I drew my gaze forward, planning out the first stage of our course towards the ledge, then glanced over at Scott as I clipped the sea scooter’s tether to my chest and switched it on. He fired his up as well, and we both leveled out our bodies and held out our sea scooters in front of us while engaging the propellers. I was surprised by the power and acceleration as we shot through the water faster than Michael Phelps freestyling towards a gold medal on the final lap. The reefs and marine life went past us in a colorful blur as we made quick workaround Mooney Harbor Key, using occasional kicks of our fins along with smooth rotations of the scooter to ease around shallower underwater features. It was then a straight shot south to the ledge, and judging by our speed, which we were maintaining at about seven and a half knots with the kicks of our fins, we would reach it in less than the forty-five minutes I’d told Jack.

  Looking up at the surface, I saw that the rains hadn’t let up. I heard what I thought was a distant roar of thunder, but as we drew nearer to the ledge, I realized that it hadn’t been thunder. I eased back on the throttle and Scott did the same beside me. The loud rumbling sound hadn’t come from above us; it had come from in front of us. I looked over at Scott, and judging by the look on his face, which I could see even behind his mask, he’d heard it too. Holding his right hand up in the water between us, he curled it into a tight fist, then spread out his fingers rapidly. It wasn’t an official diving signal, but I knew what he meant instantly. There were explosions coming from underwater near Neptune’s Table. Black Venom was trying to blow their way to the treasure.

  We slowed our pace, stopping every couple hundred feet until we were within a quarter mile of the ledge. We took cover behind a patch of coral about the size of a school bus and waited for another explosion. After five minutes, we felt it. A powerful pressure change followed by a distant rumble that shook the seafloor around us. When it comes to explosions, an underwater blast can be much deadlier than an air blast. This is because in air, a blast dissipates more rapidly and tends to be reflected by the body, whereas in the water, a blast wave travels through the body, causing internal gas-liquid interface organ damage. Fortunately, we’d been behind the reef, so we’d avoided the brunt of the wave. I glanced over at Scott, who gave me a thumbs-up, and I gave him one back.

  We pushed onward cautiously, keeping to cover as best as we could. Before we’d traveled a hundred feet towards the ledge from our hiding place, Scott pointed up at the surface and slowed his scooter to a stop. I looked up to where he was pointing and saw the dark hull of a small boat cruising quickly overhead. We pressed up against an edge of dark Staghorn coral and kept perfectly still. The hull was in and out of sight in an instant, leaving behind only a long-spreading wake. I looked at my dive watch and saw that we were only twenty-three feet below the surface. If it had been a clear day and if it had been lighter outside, they would have been able to spot us pretty easily. Turned out we were right about them having at least one of their boats on patrol around the site.

  I looked at Scott, then pointed forward and started up my propeller. Within just a few short minutes, we
spotted more hulls floating on the surface about three hundred feet in front of us. Two of them were massive, which meant they were the yacht and the salvage vessel Angelina had messaged me about. The third hull, and the only other one in sight, was much smaller, roughly the same size as the one that had cruised over our heads a few minutes prior. We noticed movement beneath the waves as well, and upon moving closer, we realized they had divers in the water descending towards the ledge. We spotted two of them and saw that they were using regular scuba equipment, making it easy to spot their large tanks and their exhalations bubbling up to the surface. Scott and I moved in slowly, keeping between the reefs that circled around the ledge. We left the sea scooters under a large spread of lettuce coral. They operated quietly, but we no longer needed to travel a long distance, and we didn’t want to risk the sound of the propellers giving away our position as we snuck up on the two unsuspecting divers.

  There was still a cloudy haze of sediment in the water surrounding the ledge from the explosions. It made the visibility worse than it would usually be, but also provided us with ample cover as we moved in closer. The ledge had been severely disfigured, now having a large crater right in its center. Pieces of rock lay spread out around it, like the aftermath of a volcanic eruption. What just hours prior had been one of the most pristine and untouched marine life habitats in all of the Keys now resembled a battlefield after a long week of fighting. There was no movement anywhere aside from the two divers. All marine life had vanished from the area, either being killed or scared off by the rapid changes in pressure. As we moved within a hundred feet of the ledge, I looked down and saw a gold coin resting on the seafloor. Examining it for a moment, I saw that it was just like the other coin I’d found there years ago. I held it out for Scott to look at, but he just pointed in front of us. Looking forward as the sediment cleared around us, I saw hundreds of the Aztec coins resting in the sand and on pieces of coral. They’d used too much explosives and as a result had launched a good portion of the treasure out of the cave.