by Karen Harper
As they started away from the wheelhouse, her light caught something, and she turned back. Cole felt the tug on their rope and came back. It was only a grouper hovering near the wheelhouse, one that looked to be the size of their old pet Gertie from the Trade Wreck. She’d like to think that Gertie had come here to keep watch over the place Daria had died.
They swam lower, right along the bottom, still laying the pen line toward where they were certain they had spotted the piece of the boat before.
Yes! There it was! The grayish glint of metal, the curved aluminum handrail that pointed toward the broken stern. Bree was confident that piece of white metal should show up in their lights. But where was it? Could the shifting sand and silt here have buried it already?
Bree motioned to Cole that she was sure it must be here. He nodded and started to brush the bottom away with both hands. Ordinarily, that would lessen visibility, but it hardly mattered where they could only see four feet anyway.
Then, there it was, the piece of Mermaids II that had borne its name and now read, MA D I. They quickly uncovered more to see if the edges were jagged or pierced.
Yes! Something from outside the hull on the stern had blown the metal inward into a gaping hole the size of a watermelon. The first time she’d seen this, that section had been under sand and silt. She supposed, even if the police took a look at this, they could insist it was caused by a collision with the concrete seawall. No, surely they could tell it had been caused by what she’d overheard Ric call a blasting cap.
Chills raced through her. She blinked back tears to avoid fogging her mask. Somehow this hole had been made below the waterline. Perhaps the perpetrator had placed the device on their boat while it was docked, hoping the small, attached bomb would not be seen. Or perhaps the bomb had been placed when the boat was at sea by someone under the surface. Was another diver in the water besides her that day? Or had the explosive been attached after the boat either drifted or was towed away? If it was towed, why didn’t Bree hear the motor or the craft doing the towing?
She looked at Cole, who nodded. He understood! Answers at last. Evidence which would lead straight to Sam Travers and his men. It all fit now, but first they had to retrieve this big piece of metal, get it up to the surface. It was so heavy that she might need both lift bags. Then she had to hope it didn’t surface where a boat was going through the pass—
A barbed shaft from a speargun zinged off the metal inches from her hand. Cole’s big body jerked; he pushed her away, yanking their tether taut. As he turned to follow, another stainless-steel spear raced past them in a blur of bubbles.
They’d been followed. By the killer? Now she knew who and why.
They could see no one, but someone could see them. Or were there two shooters down here, both Ric and Lance? Maybe the strong currents warped the speargun’s trajectory.
They turned off the dive lights that made them targets. Utter blackness closed in like a trap. Keeping the ten-foot rope between them taut, Bree kept shifting her position. She was certain Cole was doing that, too, however much he kept putting slack in their tether.
Bree’s breathing, her clicking regulator, her heartbeat and pounding pulse were like drums beating in her head. She couldn’t so much as see her own bubbles now, let alone Cole.
Suddenly, someone gripped her upper arm and pushed her up, up. Cole. It must be Cole. Yes, they had to surface, then wait to see who else came up. But she hated to leave this evidence down here. It might disappear like her sea grass meadow. She reached down to touch the metal piece from her lost boat again before Cole yanked her away.
For one moment, she feared it wasn’t Cole, but if she couldn’t see him, she could sense him. To her surprise, he forced her fingers below his mask. His regulator and mouthpiece were gone, and air gushed out of his torn hose in a blast of bubbles.
A spear must have cut through his breathing gear. She took a big breath, then pulled her mouthpiece out and pressed it toward his lips. He pulled her closer as he evidently took a breath. They could buddy breathe, but that was difficult under the best of circumstances. They’d have to ascend fast. At least they weren’t so far down that they’d get the bends. Two reasons now to get out fast.
But as Cole thrust her mouthpiece back at her, a big light blinded them. Now that their lights didn’t make them targets, their attacker needed his.
Cole shoved her one way and went the other as a spear slashed between them. Their tether pulled loose or broke, or had Cole cut it? Someone came at her—not Cole—as she started away, struggling to get her bubbling mouthpiece back in her mouth.
Up. Up! When in doubt, get out, but there was no doubt about this.
The man grabbed at her, got a fin. She kicked at him, hit her ankle on his dive light, so it went off. Was she down here alone with the enemy? Cole was out of air, out of time.
Bree jackknifed and kicked the man with both feet, hitting him in the chest. She dumped her weight belt and kicked hard, clawing at the water, fighting for the surface. She came up closer to the gulf than she wanted, but not more than twenty yards from where Manny must be.
Cole. Where was Cole?
She spun around. Nothing. Without a light, how could she go back down? She had no idea where he could be now.
In a whoosh of white water, Cole surfaced, sucking in air.
She spit out her mouthpiece. “Cole! Here!”
“Get out! I lost him!”
Yes, Bree thought as they both swam toward the seawall and Manny came running toward them, but the killer had lost them, too.
Manny grabbed under her armpits and helped pull her out. She was gasping like a beached fish, but she tried to explain what had happened to him. “A diver down there—shot at us—speargun. Hit Cole’s hose. Tried to buddy breathe, had to surface but—found a hole blasted in the hull—below waterline.”
Still sucking in huge breaths, Cole climbed out beside her, then staggered to his feet and stood to look out over the inky stretch of water. Bree scanned it, too. Nothing. No boats, no diver surfacing—nothing.
“I can’t even spot bubbles in this dark,” Cole muttered.
“It’s got to be the same guy who attacked me at the Gator Watering Hole. And the same one who blows holes in boats and bridges for Sam. At last, we know Daria’s killer! I wonder if Ric could be the father of her child.”
Bree heard Manny grunt then swear under his breath. In all the chaos, she should have told her new partner about that, but now it would have to wait until later.
“Manny,” she said, noticing his bare feet and the pool of water where he stood, which could not have come from her or Cole, “you’re soaking wet.”
“Fell in,” he said, his voice gruff. “Caramba, I think we all got in over our heads.”
Here came Bree, down the stairs. Manny had been expecting her.
After she had fed both men, Cole had fallen asleep on the sofa, where Manny heard him say he was going to spend another night. At first light, Bree and Cole were going to call the police to see who they could go talk to about retrieving the piece of bomb-blasted metal—if it was still there, Bree had said. They’d waited over an hour, pacing up and down the seawall, but no one had surfaced and they saw no boat nearby from which someone could have dived.
Manny insisted on eating at his desk downstairs while he got ready to close up and go home late. He’d called Juanita to tell her not to worry. She’d said that Lucinda wanted to bring her friend Luke over to meet them on Sunday and he was to keep his temper and be kind to the boy.
“What did you mean earlier by ‘we all got in over our heads’?” Bree asked him bluntly.
He’d been sitting at his desk, chin on his hands, staring into space. He guessed if Bree could turn Lucinda around, even a little, he owed her some of the truth, at least.
“And I’m sorry,” she said, sitting on the corner of the desk so she seemed to loom over him, “that I didn’t tell you earlier that I’d found out Daria was pregnant.”
He cleared his throat. “I knew that.”
She gasped. “Since when? Who told you?”
“Not sure when. A month at least. Daria told me—more or less.”
Bree looked as if someone had slammed her in the gut.
“Overheard her take the call. From her doctor,” he went on. “She stepped into the back room ’cause you at your desk, I guess. She didn’t know I was there, working on my knees on some stuff. You’re sure? You’re sure I’m pregnant? I hear her say.”
“But she never knew that you had overheard her secret.” Bree said that like a statement, not a question.
He sighed and shifted on his chair, suddenly aware it had been Daria’s. “Nah, dropped a wrench.”
“So you said you’d keep her secret. Did you ask who the father was?”
“She just tell me it very complicated. Yeah, that’s the word she used.”
Bree’s hands slapped her thighs. “Damn it! Why didn’t you tell me earlier, when she was missing, at least?”
He shrugged. “Honoring the dead, her last wish to me, in a way. If she was gone, nothing can be done about the baby.”
Bree jumped up and started to pace with her arms folded over her chest. Thank the blessed Virgin, he thought. She’d assumed he’d simply volunteered to keep Daria’s secret. Truth was, he’d suggested to her that he’d keep quiet if she’d turn more and more of the running of the business over to him during her pregnancy. She’d told him she was having and keeping the baby. He admired her for that, but he’d still blackmailed her, in a way. He hadn’t asked for money, but she’d offered it. As ashamed of himself as he was now, he’d taken it, a couple of hundred dollars, which he was pretty sure she got from her lover. But if Bree learned all that, she just might find a way to kick him out of here.
Cole sat on Bree’s veranda drinking coffee the next morning as she made the call to the police. He could catch occasional things she said, her voice impassioned.
That’s how he’d felt about her from the beginning, impassioned. Had it only been ten days since he’d found his mermaid washed in on the stormy shore? He felt as if he’d known her—wanted her—for years. Since their mutual drive to find what had happened to Daria might be over now, would she need him less?
He did not feel the relief she did. Yeah, everything pointed toward Sam and Ric, and Cole was glad the investigation would soon be in official hands. He still didn’t trust Verdugo, but maybe that was because he hated what he stood for, escape from reality and easy money through gambling. It had ruined his mother’s life, his dad’s and his, leaving a legacy of only loss.
He frowned in the direction of Verdugo’s yacht, where he was going to finish the paneling today so the place would look good for the shakedown cruise—the PR party, as he’d heard Verdugo call it. Cole agonized that he had sold out to Verdugo. He’d only wanted to help Bree by keeping an eye on the man, and the paneling deal had fallen into his lap as the perfect way to do that. But he still longed to chuck it all and start up a boatbuilding business of his own.
He’d agreed to go out on the casino boat tonight, but only so he could search an off-limits storage area he’d noted below decks yesterday while Verdugo was distracted by his guests. Now, he was also looking for diving gear and spearguns. The police could focus on Sam Travers and his divers, but Cole could not shake the gut feeling that Verdugo was dirty, too.
Bree came out and sat across the little table from him. She was almost smiling. That tilted the corners of her gray-green eyes and made her look less exhausted.
“Finally,” she said, and sighed so hard her shoulders rose and fell.
“They’re going to open the case?”
“A Lieutenant Mike Crawford is going to get a search warrant for Sam’s house and shop and put in a request that the police dive team retrieve the stern piece from Mermaids II in Marco Pass. I told them I hoped it was still there, because of what happened with my sea grass report to the commission. I said I’d dive with them, but they said absolutely not, that my description of the layout would be enough. And that they would interview both of us at length tomorrow morning.”
“Great!” he said, reaching over to clasp her bare knee. “I hope that now you can relax a bit.”
“For the first time, I admit I feel totally wiped out. I couldn’t let up before, not until we found Daria, buried her, then found her killer.”
“But if it is Sam or his divers, the question remains whether he meant to kill you.”
“If that was his plan, he could have done it several years ago, probably closer to when Ted died.”
“Maybe it took time for him to get to the point where he’d risk it, time to lay plans.”
“Maybe time to realize he’d get more vengeance not by eliminating me but Daria. I believe he wanted me to suffer for her loss as he had suffered with Ted’s. Then, when Daria and I dared to open a business that was competition to him, even though he could almost buy and sell us—and tried to—he just bided his time until he could make it look as if Daria had an accident. Maybe he came upon her in the storm and took his chance, maybe he stalked her. I don’t know, but I hope the police can get it out of him.”
In a way, he wanted her to go with him on the casino boat tonight, but he wanted to be alone when he searched the storage room he’d seen Verdugo’s men go in and out of.
“Verdugo said I can bring you tonight,” Cole reminded her, “but I thought you might want to just crash—sorry I put it that way. Are you okay with being alone?”
“I’ve already decided not to go. Don’t worry, Manny’s coming over to play bodyguard, since we have a lot to discuss about our new partnership. And,” she said, sounding lighthearted for once, “I’ll wait up for you, and you can tell me all about it. Besides, Lieutenant Crawford promised to call me here with an update this evening.”
“I like the sound of that, not just the police being on the case, but you waiting up for me.”
He pulled her closer and kissed her, lingeringly at first, then intensely. Her lips opened; a jolt of desire nearly shot him off his chair. Her fingers moved across his temple and through his hair, stroking it. He felt swept away, as if he was sailing full blast, skimming over the water to parts unknown but deeply desired.
When they finally broke the kiss, with her mouth moving along his cheek, she said, “I realize I’ve said this before, but I don’t know what I would have done without you through all this. Take care of yourself tonight. We might have survived by being in your boat when the sharks were in the water, but I’m afraid on that yacht, you’ll actually have some sharks on board with you.”
23
Manny was late. He’d called to say he’d had a flat tire on Golden Gate and had spun off onto the berm. Bree realized she was still suffering from the residual effects of paranoia. She should have asked him if he was all right, but instead she blurted, “You’re sure it was just a flat? No one’s tampered with the truck?”
“I know tires like I know motors. Be there as quick as I can.”
“Make sure you’re far enough off the road so no one hits you.”
“Yes, boss.”
“‘Yes, partner,’ will do,” she said as she punched off on her cell. She was hoping to use tonight to patch things up with Manny and set out some mutual rules for working together, because they had to get the business back on its feet. She was pretty sure a lot of Manny’s problems with his daughter and with her and Daria had been that he was from a culture—and a gender—that didn’t like taking orders from women. They’d have to really talk that one out, or else their partnership would never work.
Bree decided to call Amelia to update her on Lieutenant Crawford taking Daria’s suspicious death case, but knowing Ben, he was probably already up on the latest developments. For all she knew, the judge who signed the search warrant had reported right in to him. But the voice who answered the phone was not Amelia’s.
“I’m Mrs. Westcott’s sister,” Bree said. “This is the Westcott residence, isn’t
it?”
“Oh, yes. This is the babysitter, Johanna. I thought it might be my mom.”
“Please tell Mrs. Westcott I called and I’ll phone again tomorrow.”
“No problem. They went out on a big boat at the Turtle Bay Marina tonight. The boys are being really good,” the girl added, as if she had to give Bree the parent report.
“Tell them ‘hi’ from their aunt Bree, and that I’ll see them soon.”
She should have known, she thought as she put her cell on the table, that the A-list of movers and shakers around here would include Ben Westcott. She was glad Amelia was well enough to go. Patching up things with Manny was one thing, but Bree knew she had a long way to go with Amelia. She hoped she could help her believe that she was loved and had always been loved. She hoped they could help each other.
As much as she was finally starting to relax, Bree jumped when the downstairs doorbell rang. Maybe Lieutenant Crawford had stopped by in person. Deciding not to turn on the inside office lights until she saw who it was, she hurried downstairs.
It was Nikki Austin, dressed to kill, as usual. Mark stood behind her, looking pretty natty, too, leaning against the car as if the part he would play tonight was chauffeur. Snapping on the main office light, Bree unlocked and opened the door.
“Wow,” she said, admiring Nikki’s jade-green, strapless, silk cocktail dress. “You look fabulous.”
“We’re going to meet Josh on board the casino boat for the big show-and-tell party, where Verdugo shows the powers-that-be how he’s lily-white in the pollution department and tells us to get the voters to see things his way. Marla Sherborne’s attending, too.”
Bree almost told them Ben and Amelia would be there, but she decided to stick with Verdugo. “At least you’re on to the casino king,” Bree said. “Cole will be there, but, as you can see,” she added, gesturing at her shorts and T-shirt, “I’m staying put.”
She considered telling them about the police taking the case, but she decided she’d wait on that, too. It still was possible that Josh, not Ric, was the father of Daria’s baby. Then again, Daria could have met Ric on a diving job and not told Bree about their developing relationship because he worked for Sam. Even in their brief encounter, Bree had seen how charming Ric could be.
