by Kathi Daley
After several minutes, she was back. “The GPS coordinates don’t seem to be visible, at least not that I could see, but I did overhear the men talking between themselves. One of them mentioned that they should be close to the Queen Charlotte Islands and therefore needed to keep an eye out for land masses that might not be visible in the dark. It seems their sonar is on the fritz.”
I explained to the others what Alyson had just said.
“That’s a clue,” Ty said. “A good clue. Was she able to find the GPS coordinates?”
“No. And from what the men said, she thinks the ship’s sonar isn’t working.”
Mac frowned. “That’s not good.”
“No, it isn’t,” Ty said. “Let’s get the next text ready for Woody. I think we need to send if off sooner rather than later.”
Chapter 16
When the text was ready, I called for Alyson. “So, what’s the status of the four men you are watching?” I asked.
“The foreign guys are sitting in the same chairs, but now they are speaking in a language I can’t understand, so I don’t know what they are saying. Evan is still asleep in the theater, but Bret has moved up to the pool deck.”
“The pool deck? Why? What is he doing?”
“Just standing on the bow, looking out to sea.”
I glanced to the others and explained what Alyson had seen. “Damn,” Ty said.
Mac groaned. “I guess we’ll have to wait to send the text.”
“I bet he is looking for the ship Evan arranged to meet up with,” Trevor added.
“Maybe we can sneak up onto the deck very quietly to send the text,” Mac suggested.
“No. It’s too dangerous,” Ty said. “We’ll need to wait until he moves on.”
“What if one of us distracts him?” Trevor said. “I could head up to the deck, claiming to need fresh air to sober up, and then suggest we go down to get something to eat.”
“I think it is too dangerous to draw attention to ourselves,” I said. “As far as we know at this point, no one suspects us of anything. We need to keep it that way. If we start acting out of character we are opening ourselves up to closer examination. If someone does begin to suspect us, we might be detained, which would render us unable to communicate with Woody. I hate to have to wait, but I think the safest move for us to make is to stay here in our staterooms, out of the line of fire, until we know for certain that no one will see us make our move.” I looked back to Alyson. “Keep an eye on Bret. If he moves off the pool deck, let me know right away.”
“You got it.” She disappeared.
I think Alyson, as the part of me who was somewhat less than human and so unafraid of death, was actually having fun with the situation. I supposed I could understand where she might find a certain thrill in the danger and the secrecy. And she was still a teenager, after all.
“So, we wait,” Trevor said. “Is there anything productive we can be doing meanwhile?”
No one answered right away. Eventually, Mac said, “We have a handle on what is going on, and where everyone who is still on board the ship is and what they are doing. Even if we can figure out where Evan was headed, I’m not sure that is where he ended up. Short of contacting Woody to give him our update and get his, there isn’t a lot we can do.”
“I have a feeling that Bret wasn’t in on Evan’s plot until recently,” Trevor said. “Maybe we can still reason with him.”
“No,” I said. “It would be too dangerous to tip our hand. Even if he wasn’t involved until today, there is a lot of money involved and we can’t assume his sense of justice would sway him to our side. He must know that Evan killed Lucy, if he was the one who killed her.”
“You still think it might have been Harris, or even Lance?” Mac asked.
“Maybe. When Harris found out the extent of the embezzlement, he must have been desperate to keep things quiet until he could figure out a strategy. Lucy was quite adamant that they should notify the authorities. We overheard her arguing with someone in her stateroom on the day she died. I honestly can’t imagine Evan arguing with her. Why would he? If he stole the money and was aware she knew he was the thief and planned to turn him in, which we later found out she actually did, it seems to me that Evan would have just killed her and been done with it. I doubt he would have tried to reason with her.”
“But Harris might have,” Mac said.
“Yes, he might have. If Harris was desperate to keep a lid on things and Lucy was determined to call the authorities, I can see them arguing. I can even see a scenario in which they struggled, Lucy was injured—maybe she hit her head or something—and died. If Harris was responsible for her death, he must have realized that he couldn’t simply tell the others what had happened, so he dumped her body overboard.”
“Of course,” Mac said, “it is just as likely that it was Harris and Lucy you heard arguing and someone else, probably Evan, killed her, especially if he knew she planned to go to the cops.”
“Lucy did call her cousin, in the FBI, to report the theft,” Trevor pointed out. “I wonder when she did that.”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. It could have been before she had the argument, but logic would dictate that it was more likely after. If that was true, it would mean she didn’t die during the argument. Maybe it was Evan who killed her.”
“What about Lance?” Mac asked. “We know he is missing, but not what happened to him. If he was killed along with Lucy, it must have occurred after Lance came back from the trip to Port Townsend.”
“I guess that would be true,” I admitted. “Lucy could have argued with someone, most likely Harris, after the meeting, and then Harris left. Later that afternoon, Lance could have returned from shore, which would be when Lucy filled him in on what had happened. Maybe she wanted support for her decision to call the authorities. Evan might have found out and killed them both.”
“He might have, but if Evan killed both Lucy and Harris, why would he have dumped Lucy’s body in the sea but left Harris’s in the life raft cabinet?” Trevor asked.
I groaned. “There are still too many unknown variables.”
“Hopefully, if Evan is taken into custody, we’ll finally get our answers,” Mac said.
I grabbed the arm of the sofa. “Something is happening. We’re turning around.”
Ty and Trevor both walked out onto the private deck just off the living area of the stateroom. The ship was turning so sharply that it had churned up the water, creating large wakes, and began rocking a lot more than I was comfortable with. If it didn’t steady soon, I was going to need to make a mad dash to the bathroom to throw up.
“We’re stopping,” Mac said.
I could hear the engines power down.
“I don’t see anything from here but darkness and water, but it is a limited view,” Ty said.
“Alyson,” I called.
She appeared.
“What’s going on? Is there another ship approaching?”
“I’ll check.” She disappeared.
“If there is a ship nearby, Evan is going to get away with stealing from all those innocent investors,” Mac said.
“It would be too dangerous to confront him,” I reminded her. “If he does plan to transfer to another vessel, we’ll let him go and then try to figure out how to get ourselves and everyone else on board out of this mess.”
“I know, but it irks me. I wish we could allow him to leave, which would be best for us, but also track him so that law enforcement is able to catch up with him.”
I smiled. “That’s a great idea, Mac.”
“It is? What idea?”
“Tracking him.”
“How? We don’t have a tracking device to slip into his pocket or attach to his luggage.”
“No,” I said, “but we have our phones. They don’t have service now so they are basically worthless, but once they turn on, Interpol, or whoever is leading the investigation, might be able to connect with the phone’s GPS.”
“That’s actually a good idea,” Ty said. “As long as Evan doesn’t know he has the phone, it could work.”
“We need to figure out a way to slip a phone on him that he won’t realize he has and so won’t abandon,” Trevor said.
“I’d say we slip it into his jacket pocket, but that might be tricky. Maybe his luggage. I assume he plans to take it with him,” I said.
“There is no guarantee he’ll take the luggage,” Ty countered. “But it is cold out, so he’ll probably wear his heaviest jacket. I think our best odds are to put the phone in that. A pocket would be the easiest and quickest, but if we can get it into the lining, that would be better.”
“He’ll notice the bulk and the extra weight,” Trevor said.
“He might, but at this point that is the best idea we have,” I argued. “I’m not sure it will work, but I can’t see how it would hurt to try.”
We decided to use Mac’s phone because it would have service from more locations than either mine or Trevor’s, and we needed Ty’s to communicate with Woody when we were able to get the jammer offline. Mac took the phone out of its case so it would be lighter, then deleted all the apps and email accounts from it. She turned off the texting app, as well as all the sounds and notifications. Hopefully, the phone wouldn’t make any noises that would alert Evan to its presence. Now we just needed to get it into the pocket of his jacket.
“Where is the jacket?” I asked. “Does he have it on him? In his stateroom? In the bridge, which is where he has spent most of his time in the last day?”
“This sounds like a job for Alyson,” Mac said.
I called to her, asked her to find Evan and to locate the black down jacket I had seen him wearing earlier. After a few minutes, she was back. “He’s wearing the jacket and he’s up on the top deck with Bret.”
That wasn’t good. How were we supposed to slip the phone in his pocket?
“They are going to come down at some point. When they do, the jacket could come off,” Ty said. “It is warm in here.”
“What about his briefcase? Or his computer case?” I asked. “Chances are he’ll take both with him. If he is on deck, that means he isn’t in his cabin. I say we go now.”
Trevor nodded. “We’ll climb over the privacy wall between the stateroom Mac and Ty are using now and Evan’s, just like we did before.”
“At least it is only one wall this time,” I said.
Alyson was sent to keep an eye on Bret and Evan while Trevor and I started our climb over the security wall. It was tough to make the climb safely in the dark, but somehow, we made it to Evan’s stateroom. It took us only a few minutes to locate the computer bag, which we figured he was likeliest to take with him. We had slipped the phone inside one of the pockets inside the bag just as Alyson popped in.
“They’re coming.”
I motioned to Trevor, then we slipped over the privacy wall to Mac and Ty’s new cabin. As soon as we were inside the cabin farthest from Evan’s, we waited quietly so we wouldn’t be heard moving around. I quietly called to Alyson.
“Go back to listen in on Evan and Bret. We need to know what their plan is,” I told her.
She nodded and disappeared once again.
“Now what?” Mac asked.
“Now all we can do is wait,” Trevor responded.
“There is no one on the pool deck right now,” I pointed out. “We might be able to get a message off before anything happens.”
“Seems risky,” Trevor said.
“Not if Alyson keeps an eye on Bret and Evan, who are together right now. I don’t think we should all go. If they leave Evan’s cabin, it will be up to whoever stays behind to stall them.”
“Ty and I will go,” I volunteered. “Ty knows how to take the jammer offline and I’m the only one who can communicate with Alyson if she comes with a warning.”
“I think we should stay together,” Mac said. “If Alyson is watching, she can warn us in plenty of time to hide or to escape down the back stairway.”
My gut told me we should split up, but maybe staying together was the best option. “Okay,” I said. “Let me fill Alyson in on what we are going to do.”
I explained our plan to Alyson, then instructed her to tell me right away if Bret and Evan left Evan’s stateroom, then the four of us snuck down the hallway and headed to the top deck. As we had before, we’d typed out a text letting Woody know everything we had for him, including that the ship had stopped and Alyson had overheard the men in the engine room talking about the Queen Charlotte Islands, although we hadn’t actually seen land, so we had no way of knowing if that is where we actually were. Just as Ty took the jammer offline, Alyson appeared.
“Bret and Evan are on their way up the stairs.”
“We need to go,” I said.
Mac sent the text, and Ty brought the jammer back online. We headed toward the stairs at the rear of the ship, which were most often used by crew.
“No,” Alyson said. “The foreign men are coming up these stairs.”
I stopped. “There are people coming up both stairways. We need to hide.”
It was dark, so that made hiding somewhat easier.
“Behind the pool bar,” Mac said.
We all ducked down just seconds before Evan and Bret appeared in the doorway from the main stairway.
“I don’t see them,” Evan said.
“There.”
I couldn’t see what was happening, but I thought Bret must have pointed to something or handed Evan a pair of binoculars. If a ship was headed in our direction, it would have lights, which would mean it could be seen from quite a distance.
“Is everything set?” Evan asked.
“Yes, sir,” one of the foreign men answered. They must have just arrived from the other stairway. I peeked around the bar to see all four men standing less than twenty yards away.
We crouched down, staying as silent as we could. If they discovered us spying…well, I hated to think about what might happen in that case.
“I see the ship now,” Evan said. “The plan I worked out with Lance was for them to anchor, and we’ll use a life raft to row out to them. It looks like they are slowing. The two of you head down and prepare the life raft.”
“Sure thing, boss.”
“Are you sure these friends of Lance’s can be trusted?” Bret asked.
“They aren’t friends; they are mercenaries Lance hired to arrange for the pickup. They know how much money is at stake. They’ll cooperate.”
“If you say so. Should we go down?” Bret asked.
“I’m sorry, my friend, but the need for our partnership has come to an end.”
It was then I heard a gunshot. Mac’s hand flew to her mouth. I stifled a scream. Trevor wrapped his body around mine, as if he could somehow shield me should additional shots ring out. In less than thirty seconds, Evan was gone.
Chapter 17
“Evan shot Bret,” I said.
“We need to see if he’s alive,” Mac added.
“Wait. We need to be sure everyone else is gone,” Ty said, grabbing her arm.
“Alyson,” I called in a whisper.
“Did you see?” she asked.
“We heard. I need you to find out where Evan and the two other men are.”
She disappeared, but was back in only a few seconds. “The two men with the accents are on the lower deck, preparing to launch a life raft. Evan is on his way down the stairs.”
“Okay, go and keep an eye on them. Let me know when they actually launch.”
Alyson disappeared.
“It’s safe to check on Bret, but be careful. For all we know, he has a gun and may end up shooting us.”
We snuck quietly out from behind the bar. We remained in crouched positions as we made our way to Bret. Mac put her fingers to his neck.
“He’s alive.”
“Maybe, but he has lost a lot of blood,” Trevor pointed out.
“We need to get him back to the cabin,” Ty said. “Ma
ybe we can stop the bleeding.”
Trevor nodded, then picked him up. The four of us headed toward the stairs.
“Alyson,” I called again.
She appeared.
“Is the stairway clear?”
“Yes. All the men I have been watching are on the lowest deck. They are preparing to launch the life raft. It won’t be long now.”
“Okay. Bret is alive. We are taking him to our stateroom. Let me know when the life raft launches.”
She nodded and was gone.
Back in our cabin, Trevor put Bret on the bed.
“We need to dig out the bullet and then sew up the wound,” Mac said. “I’ll need a knife, something to sterilize it—any alcohol should do—and a needle and thread.”
“Trevor and I will go. The two of you, do your best to keep him alive until we get back,” I said.
“Be careful,” Mac said as we slipped into the hallway.
I knew that Trevor and I were taking a risk venturing out of the stateroom before Evan actually left the ship, but Bret would die if we didn’t remove the bullet and stop the bleeding, and the last I’d spoken to Alyson, it had sounded like all the men we still needed to watch out for were getting ready to go. We stopped off in the bar and grabbed the whiskey. We looked around for something to pry out the bullet and something to sew up the wound but didn’t find anything that would work on the dining deck.
“We need to get a knife from the kitchen, and I’m sure there must be a needle and thread in the supply closet,” Trevor said.
“Yes, but both the kitchen and the supply closet are on the lowest deck, which is where the men we are trying to avoid are. We need to wait for them to get off. It sounds as if that could happen at any moment.”
“Okay, but let’s head down to the crew deck and take a look around. There might be something we can use in one of the quarters.”
Trevor and I made our way down to deck two. We did find a sewing kit in a small supply closet, with thick thread that might be used to repair leather or some other heavy material, but we didn’t find a knife. Alyson hadn’t reappeared to give us the all clear, so we kept looking.
