Death Echo

by Elizabeth Lowell

  Emma measured the increasingly choppy water. The whitecaps that had looked so tiny from the harbor weren’t all that small—they were riding the backs of steep-sided, wind-stacked waves that looked to be three feet high.

  “Is it always like this?” she asked.

  “It can be calm as a cup of tea. It can be six-foot razor waves. It can be like now, two or three foot waves with some wind chop on top. A little snotty, but hardly noticeable on a boat the size of Blackbird.”

  “So what happened between here and Nanaimo. Just the wind?”

  “Partly wind, partly the water itself, and a good bit that we’re heading right into it,” Mac said. “The tide is pushing to the north and the wind is shoving to the south. Irresistible force meets immovable object, and we’re caught between.”

  She reached for crackers, braced herself against an unexpected motion, and waited. The next motion was equally unexpected.

  “There’s no rhythm to the waves,” she said.

  “We’re in the strait, not out on the ocean. The period between waves is shorter in the strait, less rhythmic. Unreliable. Makes for a spine-hammering ride if you’re in a small boat.”

  Carefully she stacked crackers, cheese, celery, and sliced sausage on a plate with a rim around the top and a rubber ring on the bottom. Then she looked through the windows at a world of water, wind, and sky.

  “You don’t think of Blackbird as small?” she asked.

  “Compared to a ferry or a containership, yes. Compared to most of the pleasure craft on the water, no. We’re big enough that we’re officially allowed to decide if we want to play in gale force winds, which would make these winds look like a baby’s breath.”

  “Pass,” she muttered.

  “Me, too.”

  She looked at him, surprised. “It wouldn’t be safe?”

  “Safe ain’t the same as fun,” he said. “I’d rather be tied up snug in port listening to rigging lines slap and sing than out hammering my spine through a storm. On my own time I’m a pleasure boater, not a masochist.”

  A few of the waves that broke against the bow sprayed over the decks and dotted the windshield with saltwater. Emma was aware of a change in motion, but she didn’t feel any need to hang on to things when she moved around the galley.

  Yet.

  “Will it get rougher?” she asked.

  “If the wind doesn’t drop, yes. It’s supposed to fall off as we go to the north. That’s why we’re running for Campbell River.”

  “What if it gets worse?”

  “Depends,” he said.

  “That’s an all-around, universally unsatisfactory answer. You want tea?”

  He gave her a sideways glance. “Depends.”

  “I’ll take that as a no.”

  “Yes.”

  “Yes to the no?”

  “No.”

  Laughing quietly, she put a bottle of iced tea in a holder near the wheel and gave him the food.

  “Have you eaten?” he asked.

  Watching the water, she shook her head.

  “You work on this plate,” he said, handing over the wheel. “I’ll make more after I take a bio break.”

  “Um…”

  Before Emma could think of an excuse, she was left with the wheel and her doubts about steering Blackbird in anything but calm water.

  “Put it on auto if you want,” Mac called over his shoulder as he disappeared below with a handheld VHF radio. “Just make sure you stay well outside those rocks and islands.”

  “What rocks and islands?”

  “Zoom out on the chart. You’ll see what I mean.”

  She zoomed out on the computer screen, saw what he meant, and frowned. Going around the various small islands would take longer. But then, going aground would waste even more time.

  Mac’s voice floated up from below. “If you’re nervous, I can keep an eye on things while I pee off the stern.”

  “Great, I’m stuck on a boat with a flasher.”

  “Flashers are used with downriggers. For trolling. Wanna see how it’s done?”

  “MacKenzie, just pee!”

  Laughter, then she was alone with Blackbird and frisky water. She thought about putting the controls on auto, then decided to try learning the rhythms—if any—of boat and water.

  With her hands on the wheel, Blackbird became a living presence caught between external forces and its own nature. The balance between vessel and water shifted continually. At the edges of her concentration she heard the sounds of the head flushing and the static of a VHF radio. Mac was talking to someone.

  She was too busy to wonder who or why. She oversteered a few waves, overthought a few more, and was surprised by several. The waves seemed steeper than they had been.

  At least some of them did. The problem was, she couldn’t tell which ones until it was too late to do much but stagger on through.

  “Different when the water is choppy,” Mac said cheerfully as he climbed up from the lower deck.

  Emma’s hands were clenched around the wheel. She stood in front of it, stiff-legged, her face tense.

  “A lot more motion,” she agreed curtly.

  “Ever ride a horse with a western saddle?”

  “Yes.”

  “Move with the boat as you would a horse,” Mac said. “Loosen your knees. Let your spine flex. Fighting against the motion just tires you out.”

  She looked at him. He was relaxed, balanced, his legs apart and his knees loose.

  He looked good. Edible, even.

  Blackbird took advantage of her lack of attention. The bow slid off the heading, pushed by the quartering waves.

  “You’d better grab it,” Mac said.

  He moved closer as he took a cracker and a slice of cheese from the plate by the pilot station.

  Emma turned the wheel too hard. She knew it even before the boat’s bow went past centerline.

  “Damn,” she said under her breath as she swung the wheel hard the other way.

  Too far.

  Again.

  “Give the helm a chance to respond before you crank on the wheel again,” he suggested.

  “I know,” she said, remembering his instructions when she took the wheel on and off during the run to Nanaimo. “I’m just not doing it. The choppy water makes everything different.”

  “Relax. Have a cracker.”

  He fed one to her before she could object.

  She chewed through the cracker and cheese, forced herself to slow down, and handled the helm more gently. To her relief, the boat responded. The motion evened out.

  “Good,” he said. “Now, look at the compass. Try to steer a course of 340 degrees.”

  She studied the compass dial beneath its glass dome and identified the 340-degree mark. It danced slowly with each motion. She tried to make tiny corrections on the helm to keep the alignment exact.

  “Remember what I told you before?” he asked calmly, picking up another cracker. “Five degrees on either side is fine. It all evens out on the water. Blackbird isn’t suspended like a race car, where every little twitch from the driver results in a big change in the car’s direction.”

  Emma loosened her grip on the wheel and eased the tension from her shoulders and legs. She quickly realized that if she didn’t try to anticipate every little motion of the boat, she felt more relaxed.

  Not more in control, just less unhappy about it.

  “Check the compass heading from time to time and save your real attention for watching the water ahead,” Mac said. “You can’t avoid the waves, but you can dodge rafts of seaweed and logs.”

  “Yikes.” Emma narrowed her eyes and stared out at the water.

  “I’d forgotten about the logs.”

  “Seaweed will shut down your cooling system real quick. Hot engines freeze up. Bad luck all around.”

  “God, Mac. All the sweet talk. Don’t know if I can take it.”

  Smiling, he crunched into another cracker, this time with a slice of sausage and c
heese.

  As water rolled on beneath the hull, Blackbird and Emma reached a wordless understanding. She didn’t crawl all over the controls and the boat settled into doing what caused the least motion while still sticking to a route that would lead eventually to Campbell River. Like a horse trained to the western style of riding, Blackbird responded best to a light hand on the reins.

  Mac reduced the plate of food to random crumbs before he looked up. “Did you eat?”

  “The cracker you fed me.”

  He stepped over to the galley, sliced, assembled, and threw in some potato chips and cookies for variety. Celery tasted fine when you’d been out on the water for a week and fresh greens had been scarce. But celery the first day of a trip? Not if he had a choice.

  Mac went back to stand next to Emma and started feeding her crackers and cheese. He told himself that there was nothing sexy about giving a woman food from his fingers. Nothing sexy about watching her tongue lick away crumbs. Nothing sexy about the accidental touch of her lips. Nothing…

  The hell with it.

  He’d never been real good at lying to himself.

  “Mac?”

  “Yeah?” he asked absently, watching her tongue.

  “This marked-off area…” She pointed to the computer chart.

  “Whiskey Gulf,” he said without looking at the chart. “A Canadian naval firing range. I just called, and they’re not active until dawn tomorrow, so we don’t have to go around. Keep on this course until I tell you otherwise.”

  “Okay. Er, aye, aye, Captain.”

  Mac wondered if she’d take orders as well in bed. Or give them.

  Hold that good thought until we—

  The primary VHF radio resting in a holder by the wheel came to life with an update of the past weather report. Emma tried to listen, steer, and keep the speed up in the face of rapidly changing wind and water.

  And eat.

  When the radio stopped spitting words, she swallowed half-chewed food and said to Mac, “Translation?”

  “Small-craft warning has been shifted to include Campbell River.”

  “Meaning?”

  “If I was in a small boat, I’d come about and run back to Nanaimo, just like them.” He pointed to their port side. Miles away, two small white boats raced along the shore.

  “But we’re a big girl, right?” she asked, lightly turning the wheel, anticipating the next action of boat and water.

  “You sure are.” He popped a chocolate cookie into his mouth.

  Blackbird rose to meet the choppy waves, slid through, and lined up for another round of whatever the strait delivered.

  “Good,” he said simply. “You’re a natural on water.”

  She looked pleased. “Thanks. Eat more cookies. It improves your sweet talk.”

  “I’m not sweet-talking. People can learn navigation and rules, but a feel for the water can’t be taught. It’s there or it isn’t.”

  “Like languages.”

  “Or shooting.” He crunched into another cookie.

  “About that sweet talk…”

  “I’m practicing,” he said. “See? I’m eating cookies.”

  “And I’m thinking it would take more than cookies to sweeten your tongue.”

  “If we were on calm water, I’d prove how wrong you are.”

  She looked at him, knew what he meant, thought about how good he’d felt when she petted him in her arm-candy mode. She took a breath and reminded both of them, “We’re not on calm water. Damn it.”

  Then she shut up and concentrated on handling the boat instead of its captain.

  43

  DAY FOUR

  STRAIT OF GEORGIA

  2:28 P.M.

  Lina felt the increasing strength of wind in the action of the water. A meter high and occasionally higher, the steep-sided, unevenly spaced waves broke over whichever part of the Redhead II was handy. Even seated, with the wheel to hang on to, the open cockpit of the boat was an uncomfortable ride.

  Wet, too, despite the cloudless sky.

  Her only consolation was that Demidov had to be more miserable than she was. He wore the cheap slickers she used for clients who didn’t bring their own. She was in a medium weight Mustang suit and wore warm, waterproof boots. He didn’t. She was accustomed to being on the water. He wasn’t.

  Never know it from looking at him, she thought sourly.

  Driving in circles waiting for Demidov to do something was even more boring than trolling in circles waiting for a salmon to bite.

  “Where are they?” she finally asked him.

  Despite her intentions, her voice came out sharp, demanding.

  Demidov glanced at the small, bright screen of the cell phone. “Head five degrees more to the southeast.”

  She looked at the compass, then at water.

  “I’ll have to tack back and forth on that heading,” she said, “or I’ll take on too much water over the stern. My boat isn’t designed for following seas.”

  “Just get us five degrees to the southeast.”

  When Lina put the boat into a turn, she made certain he was the one who got whitewashed by the waves. A petty triumph, but with Demidov, she took what victories she could.

  Why wasn’t he murdered? So many others were.

  But Taras Demidov was still alive. She was stuck with the devil himself until he had no more use for her.

  Rather distantly, Lina hoped he left her alive when she no longer served a purpose.

  Kill him yourself. Shove him overboard and leave him for the crabs.

  She rejected the thought almost as soon as it came. Even in rough water, scanning the strait through binoculars, Demidov had the balance and predatory awareness of a cat. It was unnatural. Unnerving.

  If anyone went overboard, it would be her.

  It infuriated Lina that she had grown older while he had grown more dangerous, but she wasn’t stupid enough to act on her emotions. In that, at least, she was his equal.

  “That’s far enough,” Demidov said abruptly. “Turn off the big outboards and get on the little one.”

  “Are you talking about the kicker?”

  “Is that the small engine?”

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Then do it.”

  Lina bit back her objections. Her gear would keep her dry from the neck down—she hated hats and only wore them when the temperatures dropped below freezing. If she got a saltwater face wash and cold water down her back today, she’d still be more comfortable than the devil who had commandeered her boat.

  She cut the big outboards and staggered back to the stern, thrown off-balance by the choppy, unpredictable waves. Not for the first time, she wished she’d replaced the little kicker with a bigger one that had an electronic starter. But she hadn’t. She would pay for that now.

  As she reached for the pull rope to start the kicker, water slammed into the boat and spray slapped across her face. She yanked the starter rope once, and again, then again. On the fourth try the small outboard shuddered, belched a cloud of unburned gas and oil that wind swept back into the boat, and died.

  Demidov looked sharply at her.

  She ignored him and yanked on the starter rope again. This time the engine not only caught, it held. Bracing herself on the stern gunwale, she steered Redhead II with the kicker.

  It wasn’t easy, but it could be done.

  Barely.

  Rather savagely she hoped that Demidov appreciated the uneven, sloppy, stomach-churning ride.

  At least it isn’t raining, she thought. It shouldn’t take long for Blackbird to spot us.

  44

  DAY FOUR

  STRAIT OF GEORGIA

  2:31 P.M.

  Emma was comfortable enough with the wind and water that she had hopped up into the pilot’s seat behind the wheel. More a loveseat than a simple chair, the cushion was big enough for two to use. Once she sat down, the riding-a-horse analogy was even more apt. She let the motion of the boat go through her spine in an in
visible wave.

  Mac settled on the padded bench seat next to her, close enough for her to feel his warmth. She liked that almost as much as the fact that both of them were relaxed with the silence and one another.

  The multitude of pleasure boats that had cluttered the water near Nanaimo had disappeared. The few boats she could see were well off in the distance, much closer to land, leaving white streaks on the water as they slammed from wave-top to wave-top in a run for whatever safe anchorage was within reach.

  “How often do they change the weather report?” Emma finally asked.

  “Depends.”

  “On the weather?” she asked sweetly.

  “On how bad they missed the forecast the first time.”

  “I don’t know much about weather, and less about water, but…” Her voice faded into the hiss and smack of waves against the hull.

  “Yeah.” Mac looked at the whitecaps, measured how much spray lifted into the air. “The wind looks closer to twenty than fifteen, much less ten. The gusts are at least twenty-five.”

  “Still want to go to Campbell River?” she asked.

  “Is your stomach kicking?”

  Emma looked surprised. “No. Should it be?”

  “Some people get seasick on a floating dock.”

  “Guess I’m not one of them.”

  “We could take a lot more wind than this and be perfectly safe,” Mac said. “Unless you’re uneasy—”

  “As in puke green?” she said, smiling.

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m not.”

  “So kick the throttles up a notch and keep going.”

  “How much is a notch?” she asked.

  “Take it up to twenty knots, more if the motion doesn’t bother you. We’ve got time to make up.”

  “Aye, aye, Captain,” she said, and hit the throttles.

  The sound of the diesels deepened. The wake behind the boat churned out even more white. Surprisingly, the ride didn’t change much, neither smoother nor rougher. The fuel consumption sure shifted, though.

  “We’re filling up the tanks in Campbell, right?” she asked.

  “Yes. Why?”

  “We eat a lot more diesel at this speed.”