From the corner of his eye, Deke was able to catch the time on his watch. He was almost at the fifteenth minute of the dive. Taking measured breaths from his Nitrox mixture of air, Deke knew he still had at least a quarter of a tank. The more immediate concern was he only had five minutes to land his fish.
He continued to remain as motionless as possible. The passage of time was trying his patience, but he didn’t alter his hunting plan.
Three minutes remaining.
Patience didn’t come easy to Deke, either in his job or in his fishing, but he had learned that sometimes it was a strategic necessity to let events unravel.
An amberjack slowly came his way. Deke’s breath caught. This could be it. But as the fish neared, Deke could see that it wasn’t large enough to win the day. Still, it would mean plenty of fish for weekend kabobs. Some fishermen mistakenly believed amberjack didn’t make for good eating; those same fishermen had clearly never dined on Deke’s marinated amberjack kabobs.
The shot was there. Deke’s trigger finger tightened, but he decided not to take it. There was still time, and Deke wasn’t yet ready to make his concession speech.
He saw the shadow before he could make out the body, a moving patch of darkness that appeared more spectral than substance. As the figure materialized, the silver-blue fish showed itself more clearly. It was a big amberjack, at least twenty pounds. Deke willed it to come closer. Adrenaline surged through his body, but he remained still, barely blinking. The big fish didn’t seem to notice him. Maybe he didn’t register as a threat. Maybe the fish thought it was well out of harm’s way.
Twenty feet, ten. Just a little closer for a clean gill shot, Deke thought.
The fish met its end at eighteen minutes and forty-eight seconds into their dive.
* * *
As Deke made his victory official by weighing the fish, Robin kept talking about Deke’s “lucky win.”
“Fluke win you might say,” Deke said. “By the way, we’re looking at twenty pounds, four ounces. Your fish is just under sixteen pounds.”
“You made that shot at the last possible second.”
“There was plenty of time still on the clock. And speaking of a ticking clock, I wouldn’t wait on making your purchase for the big game. There’s a sale going on right now at the University of Florida gift shop. What do you think about modeling a Gator dress at this year’s party?”
Robin made it clear he didn’t think much of that idea, which only made the grin on Deke’s face larger as he iced and stowed the fish. Both men recovered from their dive by hydrating with water. They usually rested for at least an hour before their second dive. In the last few years, they’d started to devote a part of each trip to spearing as many lionfish as possible. The invasive species was wreaking havoc on Florida’s reefs and fisheries.
Deke tried to keep diving sacrosanct and not let business intrude, but he still found himself reaching for his phone to scan the morning’s texts and emails. One of the texts was from Diana. She knew he was out diving that morning and wouldn’t have encroached on his private time without good reason. He read her note, ground his teeth together, and said, “Dammit.”
“What is it?”
“We’re not the only ones out spearfishing. A federal judge is trying to impale me with a motion to show cause. But if he thinks I’m going to be easy to land, he’s about to learn differently.”
“You want to go in?”
“It wouldn’t be fair to cut our trip short,” Deke said.
“Your last-second win already ruined my day. There’s no need to prolong my misery.”
XXVII
Gina Romano looked up from Judge Irwin’s motion to show cause order and said, “It’s not like any of this came as a surprise.”
Deke rolled his eyes. For the past half hour, he and Gina had been hunkered down in his office studying the email file sent out that morning by the judge. The motion to show cause asked for Deke to appear in open court on the following Tuesday morning to defend his actions. By filing the motion, the judge asserted Deke had done something sanctionable by the court. The fallout from such a motion typically resulted in a fine or judicial rebuke, or both. When taken to an extreme, it could also result in Deke’s removal from the case.
“The best-case scenario is that Irwin will use this motion as an opportunity to browbeat me, and while I don’t relish the idea of being his whipping boy, what bothers me most is that you can be sure he’ll use this opportunity to reiterate the terms of his gag order. That’s the real issue here, and one I’d like to find a way to push back on. When gag orders start being used in this manner, they might as well be called gag and shackle orders.”
“We can ask for more time to prepare. It would be very hard for him to refuse that. Three days to prepare for this motion is a ridiculous turnaround time.”
Deke shook his head. “Let’s not. I expect that’s what Irwin wants us to do, and by granting us more time it would allow him to look reasonable in the court record. My assertion is that he’s not acting reasonably, and I intend to show that.”
“Wrong. I’m the one who’s going to show that. You’re not going to say a single word during the proceeding. Your only job will be to sit there and look like a choirboy.”
“I don’t do choirboy very well,” Deke said.
“Then you had better start practicing your singing.”
“But . . .”
Gina didn’t even allow him to start his argument. “Don’t even think about it. You know I’m right, and that it makes no sense for you to represent yourself. If you and Irwin get into a pissing match, you’ll lose the high ground. That’s not a position we want to give up. In fact, I intend to build on it. So, while I sing your praises in court, you need to appear to be the wronged victim.”
“I am the wronged victim.”
“The contrite and humble and silent wronged victim,” she said.
Deke sighed.
“Judge Irwin is clearly going to make this about your violating his gag order. He thinks he’s going to make an example of you. When he’s not looking, we’ll make it about him. I intend to show him the error of his ways.”
She smiled. Deke was glad he was on the right side of this particular smile, knowing it was a portent of things to come. Even though Gina was an attractive woman, she wasn’t showing her teeth to look pretty as much as she was baring them.
“What’s your plan?”
“My plan is to leave this office, enlist two of the firm’s best associates, and have them help me research case law all weekend. We’ll comb through appellate court ruling and find as many instances as possible where it was determined that the lawyer’s First Amendment right to comment about political or social issues was not superseded by the judicial overreach of a protective order, especially as it pertains to serious public health and safety issues.”
“I like the sound of that. I’m going to be tied up for the next few hours, but after that I’ll have some time to brainstorm with you and your associates.”
Gina shook her head. “I’ve got this. All you’d be doing is getting in the way.”
Deke opened his mouth. Gina’s look made him shut it. She nodded with satisfaction, and stood up.
“I’m going to go find my legal eagles. They’ll be doing a sleepover at my place this weekend.”
“I’ll be available if you want to discuss strategy,” Deke said.
Gina covered her ears, pretending she hadn’t heard a word he’d said, and walked out of his office.
“It’s been great listening to you,” Deke called out to her back.
* * *
Ten minutes later, Deke’s office was occupied again, this time by Jake, Carol, and Michael. Deke didn’t even wait for them to be seated before starting in with his questions.
“What’s the latest?”
Carol handed Deke a pile of paperwork. “That’s what we have on Vicky Driscoll. The short version is that Mrs. Driscoll is a naturalized American citizen by
way of Ukraine. She uses her ownership of the Emerald Hideaway to get H2B workers into the country, but they do more than work at her hotel. Driscoll owns a strip club called the Pussy Cat Palace in Panama City, and operates at least one massage parlor in Bay County. She also owns a yacht called the Seacreto that is used for suspect boat charters.”
“Suspect in what way?”
“It’s a vehicle for prostitution. While we were doing our investigation, Michael was making his own inquiries into the matter. He found a witness who said dancers from the club regularly entertained at sea.”
“So, we’re pretty sure the woman who drowned was on that boat for the purposes of prostitution?”
Carol nodded. “That’s our working theory.”
“But we still don’t know her identity?”
“We’re hoping to get word from USCIS today. So far all they have confirmed is that Karina Boyko is in this country on an H2B visa as a hospitality worker in the employ of Mrs. Driscoll.”
Deke asked, “Do we know if Driscoll reported Karina’s being missing to either the local authorities or to the governmental agencies overseeing the temporary workers?”
Shaking her head, Carol said, “From what we know, there wasn’t any missing person’s report submitted to the sheriff’s office. Ditto the Coast Guard. No nautical accidents were reported either. As for USCIS, they refuse to comment on that subject, so we don’t know if she contacted them.”
Deke couldn’t help but notice that Michael was leaning forward in his seat, anxiously waiting for his chance to jump into the conversation.
Making eye contact with him, Deke said, “Better speak, before you burst.”
Michael took the invitation to discuss his investigation of private charter boats in the area and his conversation with Captain Moss.
“You’ve been busy,” Deke said.
“Much to my surprise,” Carol said.
“Oh?” Deke turned to Michael for an explanation.
“I should have talked to Carol before investigating the marinas. Next time I will.”
“Seems to me I’ve made that same promise to her a few times myself,” Deke said.
“Seems to me that whenever you’ve failed to do so, bad things have happened,” Carol said. “Like almost having your head caved in.”
Deke gingerly touched the side of his head. “Point well taken. And speaking of which, any news of our fugitive?”
Jake’s head bobbed up and down. “We actually just got off the phone with a contact in the Jacksonville area who knows Rodríguez. According to him, Tío Leo was in the area. We told the informant if he wants his payday, we’ll need to get a specific address of where Leo’s holed up.”
“Let’s hope the informant is on the up and up,” Deke said. “Anything else?”
“The drowned woman . . .” Michael said, letting the words hang for a moment before continuing. “I’m pursuing a potential lead. It might be nothing, and my thinking could potentially be compromised because of my own personal biases, but my gut tells me something’s there.”
“Let’s hear it,” Deke said.
Michael took a moment to get his thoughts together. “There’s one thing in particular I haven’t been able to get out of my head since my visit to Panama City. The charter boat captain told me that he’d taken out a group of military contractors, and that he overheard them talking about their plans for going out on a party boat with some dancers from a strip club.
“The timing of their planned outing seems to align with the drowned woman’s death. They would have gone out the day before the fall squall. And as far as I have been able to determine, only one strip club in Panama City sends its dancers out on a party boat.”
“So, what’s your hesitation in following up?” Deke said.
“I want to make sure that this isn’t wishful thinking, that I’m not seeing some kind of synchronicity in all of this because it suits my own purposes.”
Deke said, “If you want my two cents’ worth, I’m a big believer in synchronicity.”
“I can’t even offer one cent, because I don’t know what that means,” Carol said.
“I’ll offer my definition without The Twilight Zone sound effects,” Michael said. “Synchronicity is when seemingly random things happen at the same time, but it’s almost as if those events were meant to be connected.”
Half skeptical, half curious, Jake said, “Is that like the universe is talking to you?”
Michael said, “I’m not going there. What I do know is what the charter boat captain told me. He said the military contractors were celebrating a successful recruiting campaign, and they were arranging for an outing with strippers. Without any prompting, he even offered me the name of their group leader: Rock. That happens to be the nickname of Peter Stone, the founder and president of Darkpool Security International.”
“Darkpool,” Deke said, recognizing the name.
“My buddies in the service called it Dark Ghoul. They’re the biggest PMC—private military contractor—in the world. That’s a fancy way of saying they’re an army of mercenaries. Peter Stone is a modern-day war-lord who dispatches his private army to the highest bidder. His biggest client is our own government. Most American citizens are completely unaware of how dependent we’ve become on these mercenaries. These days it’s not uncommon for private military contractors to outnumber US armed forces. In Iraq and Afghanistan, half of the soldiers were contracted. The reason these mercenaries have been so popular with our government is that they don’t count as boots on the ground. That means in a numbers game it appears we are not as heavily committed in a military action as we really are.”
“You don’t sound like a proponent of using them,” Deke said.
“I detest the idea of using PMCs in a war zone.”
Deke liked the fire he was seeing in his associate and stoked it a little. “Why?”
“Because I don’t think multinational corporations should be in the business of war. It’s too easy for bad things to happen in a war zone, especially if you’re not accountable like you are in the military. PMCs don’t need to abide by the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Perhaps as a consequence of that, they’ve been involved in all sorts of bad shit.”
“Such as?”
“There have been stories of bribery, torture, rape, kidnapping, murder, and even sex slavery rings. When there’s a profit motive for war, it’s a lot more difficult to establish a peace. Most of these mercenaries aren’t even Americans, which means they don’t serve our government; they serve the contractor. And if you have rot at the top, what do you expect to happen down the line? Peter Stone was tossed from the Navy Seals with an OTH—other than honorable—discharge. For Stone, getting bad paper was no big deal. In fact, it allowed him to fully embrace the business of war by starting up Darkpool. And he got to walk away from war crimes because the navy didn’t want the embarrassment of trying to prosecute him.”
“What kind of things did he allegedly do?”
“He tortured prisoners. Witnesses say he even murdered one of them. And he beheaded an enemy corpse for a photo op.”
“So, he’s bad news and bad things happen around him. And it wouldn’t surprise you if one of those bad things was a woman who drowned?”
“It fits right in with his CV.”
Deke prodded Michael a little. “Is that why you sound so pissed?”
“It’s part of it. And just the thought of Stone potentially being involved in this young woman’s death stirred up some things from the past. Bad mojo all around made it feel personal.”
“Synchronicity?” Carol asked.
Michael shrugged. “Maybe. A good friend of mine in the service, a PJ named Cal, died because of Darkpool’s lax security and failure to follow protocols on a military base. We were almost overrun by the enemy. Cal was shot and killed during a firefight.”
An incredulous Jake said, “Private military contractors were handling the security for a US base?”
“Crazy, ri
ght? Look, I’m not saying all the freelance soldiers are bad. Most of the securing and staffing transport lines fell to them, and they did a mostly good job under bad circumstances. But these contractors were never invested in the overall mission. They were there for a fat paycheck; we were there for our band of brothers. And those who were bad apples really muddied the waters for the rest of us. It was hard for the citizenry to distinguish between the mercenaries and us. Before she became a US citizen, my wife, Mona, said the people in her own village distrusted our military because the mercenaries had extorted them.”
Carol asked, “Your wife is an Iraqi?”
“Yeah, of Assyrian descent. Most of her fellow Christian Assyrians had already fled the country in a series of diasporas. Mona’s family stayed too long.”
Deke got the question in first: “What happened?”
“It’s a long story.”
“I think we can spare a few minutes,” Deke said.
Michael took a deep breath. He shifted in his seat, clearly uncomfortable at being put on the spot. “I’ll give you the abbreviated version,” he said, then offered a bare-bones account of his team’s rescue of Mona.
When he finished, Carol said, “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be. That’s how I met the woman I love. And getting back to an earlier subject, maybe it explains why I don’t discount the notion of synchronicity. After delivering Mona to the Air Force hospital in Belad, I couldn’t get her out of my thoughts. Just two days after her arrival at the hospital, I was brought there myself with a broken back.”
Deke did a double-take. “You broke your back?”
“I fractured my spine as a result of a helicopter landing gone wrong.” Michael took a breath and then added, “There was also a traumatic brain injury, which healed over time, thank god. I look at all of that as a small price to pay, though. Mona and I convalesced together in the same hospital. For as long as possible, I put off being transferred for treatment to the Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany because I didn’t want Mona to be alone. By the time I finally relented, Mona and I were engaged.”
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