The Broken Chase

by Cap Daniels

  I started both diesel engines and watched the gauges come to life. I then went to work casting off the lines that held my new boat to Barkov’s former yacht. Once clear of the yacht, I turned the cat into the southerly wind and set about getting some sails in the air. There was a bit of a learning curve as I mentally labeled each halyard, reefing line, and sheet. With the sails aloft, I let the cat bear away from the wind onto a northeasterly course, and watched the enormous white sails fill with the fifteen-knot breeze. I trimmed the sails and shut down the engines, then reveled in the near silence of the majestic sailing cat as she accelerated and settled on ten knots.

  After savoring the first setting of the sails on my new boat, I set about learning how my new chart plotter and autopilot worked. Soon, I could plot a course and have the boat steer herself in the direction I wanted. With the boat sailing true and my sails trimmed to perfection, I headed for the interior to find Anya, but I didn’t have to go far. She came bouncing through the doorway from the main salon and onto the aft deck wearing the smile of a child on Christmas morning.

  “Oh, Chasechka, it is beautiful and so big. I love it. I love it so much and we are not flipping over.”

  She threw her arms around me and made a sound that would perhaps be a normal woman’s squeal of delight, but I’d never known Anya to squeal.

  “Yes, these are beautiful boats, and they don’t flip over, as you put it.”

  Anya climbed onto the captain’s chair behind the wheel and peered over the controls. It was nice to see her relaxing and finding joy in being alive. Her life had been constant work for people who demanded her constant perfection. Those days were gone, and it pleased me to be the reason she could start living, rather than merely existing to serve her domineering masters.

  “Come. Come.” Anya grabbed my hand and pulled me to the trampoline that made up the foredeck of the cat. She jumped and giggled like a schoolgirl before lying facedown and staring at the water through the mesh.

  I watched the rise and fall of her shoulders as she breathed. I remembered the first time I’d watched her breathe. I was peering through my binoculars from a half mile away, and she was poised behind a rifle on top of a water tower in Elmont, New York. I knew so much more about her than I had back then, but I was still just as fascinated and smitten. I admired the curve of her back and the toned, long muscles of her legs. I sat in awe of her until her shrill scream pierced the air.

  “Chase, look! Look!”

  I peered through the trampoline to see a pair of bottlenose dolphins swimming millimeters beneath the surface of the water, perfectly matching the speed of the boat.

  Anya wouldn’t look away. “Is this really our boat now?”

  I gazed across the deck of the beautiful sailing cat. “I think it is.”

  Anya rolled onto her side and pulled me toward her until we were wrapped in each other’s arms and kissing passionately.

  The emotions the two of us had experienced over the previous twelve hours were more than any normal person could’ve endured, but the minds and bodies of two well-trained assassins are far from normal.

  I wanted to surrender and make love with her right there on the trampoline, but I couldn’t. Not yet. I was consumed by a tsunami of thoughts that wouldn’t let me give myself to her.

  If Dr. Richter doesn’t survive, can we still keep Anya in America and grant her citizenship? What will become of Barkov’s yacht? How will I replace everything I lost aboard Aegis? Oh shit, it’ll be dark soon.

  “Anya, listen.” I took her perfect face in my hands. “There’s nothing I’d rather do than make love with you, but we have to get ready for nightfall.”

  “Yes, Chase, I know. Time for this will come later.”

  We rose from the trampoline and made our way back to the cockpit where I went to work on the chart plotter.

  “Tell me what you are doing,” Anya said.

  “I’m looking for a place to anchor. It’ll be dark soon, and we’re going to collapse from exhaustion. Neither of us has the stamina to sail through the night.”

  “I do,” she said confidently, “but I do not know how to sail this boat. You will teach me, yes?”

  “Yes,” I said, “I’ll teach you, but now is not the time for a sailing lesson.”

  I scanned the chart for several minutes. “Here it is. We’ll run across to Bimini. Honeymoon Harbor is a great anchorage. We’ll run in there for the night and head north again tomorrow after we get some sleep.”

  Anya wrinkled her brow. “There is that word again, honeymoon. Tell me what this means.”

  “It’s just the name of the harbor. It doesn’t mean anything.”

  Anya made a disapproving face. She wasn’t going to let me get away with that answer.

  “Okay, okay. A honeymoon is a vacation people take right after they get married, but really, in this case, it’s just the name of the harbor . . . really.”

  “We will have honeymoon someday, yes?”

  I tried to ignore the question. “It’s about thirty miles to the Great Bahama Bank. We’ll make that in less than three hours, and we’ll be sound asleep a few minutes after that.”

  Anya was still grinning at me, waiting for an answer, but I wasn’t going to play her game—at least not yet.

  “Let’s check the lights to make sure they all work. We don’t want to have to deal with the Coast Guard if we don’t have to. We don’t have any identification.”

  Apparently, she wasn’t interested in checking lights because she walked off and left me alone on deck. I flipped the switches for all of the navigation lights and found them to be working perfectly. The anchor light, deck lights, and spotlights were also in working order. Satisfied with the light check, I programmed the destination into the chart plotter and let the autopilot bring the big cat around on her new course. I retrimmed the sails and settled into one of the large, cushioned seats in the cockpit.

  Anya emerged from the main salon, carrying a tray, and wearing a Miami Dolphins t-shirt and a pair of shorts drawn tightly around her waist.

  “Where’d you get that outfit?” I tried not to laugh at how the baggy clothes hung from her thin frame.

  “They were inside boat, and I like dolphins, so I take. You like?”

  I laughed, “Yes, I like.”

  Anya placed the tray beside me on the cushion. It held two sandwiches, an apple, and two Diet Cokes.

  “Where’d you get the food?” I asked.

  “It was also inside boat. Now eat.”

  I did as I was told and devoured the sandwich and one of the drinks. I watched Anya open the Diet Coke, sniff at it, and then take a reluctant sip.

  She wrinkled her nose. “I do not like. Is terrible.”

  “It’s better with rum.” I pointed off to the west. “Look at that gorgeous sunset.”

  She sighed. “It is. I never look at sun going away until you show me this on first Aegis boat.”

  I remembered the first sunset she and I watched together before we knew we could trust each other, before we knew our lives would become perfectly entangled with each other’s. As we approached the Great Bahama Bank, I motioned for her to join me in front of the chart plotter. She hovered over my shoulder to get a view of the screen

  “Now watch the depth sounder. It’s the big number in the lower left corner,” I said.

  “Three hundred twenty meters?”

  “No, it’s feet, but watch.”

  Her eyes widened as she watched the depth fall from over three hundred feet to eleven feet in less than a minute.

  “Chase! The bottom is going to hit us.”

  I chuckled. “It’s deep enough for us. This is the Great Bahama Bank. I wanted you to see how quickly the depth changes here.”

  “Is mountain in ocean. No. Is a mountain in the ocean,” she said.

  I squeezed her. “My American girl.”

  “This is honeymoon place?”

  “No. Honeymoon Harbor is right over there. We’ll be there in a few min
utes.”

  “Okay,” she said. “I will make for you honeymoon drink. Inside boat is alcohol, too.”

  I furled the sails, turned on the lights, and motored into Honeymoon Harbor. There were only three other boats in the anchorage, so I easily found a spot to anchor for the night.

  For the first time, I left the exterior of my new home and ventured into the main salon, which also contained a kitchen, or a galley, and a navigation station. The interior was as beautiful as the exterior, if not more. The countertops looked like marble, but were no doubt a manmade solid surface material to keep the weight down. The plumbing fixtures were brushed nickel, and the electronics were more impressive than the equipment in the cockpit. There was a well-stocked bar and pantry full of provisions sufficient for several weeks. Dominic had taken very good care of us.

  I heard the whine of the pump come to rest and wondered why it was running. Moments later, Anya appeared on the stairs with wet hair. There was no sign of the Miami Dolphins t-shirt or baggy shorts.

  “After your shower,” she said in Russian, “your drink and I will be waiting for you in your bed, my stinky captain.”

  Exhausted from the last several hours of my life, my body and mind needed sleep, but neither my body nor my mind could resist Anya. We made love, trying to forget what we’d endured. Then, merciful sleep overtook us. We found ourselves lost and entangled with each other, and we slept as if we hadn’t in weeks.

  * * *

  I awoke with the sunrise and watched Anya sleeping peacefully in my arms. When I tried to sneak from the bed without waking her, she stirred.

  I kissed the top of her head. “You sleep. I’m going to make breakfast.”

  I found some clothes provided by Dominic that almost fit, and I headed for the galley. In minutes, I had coffee brewing, eggs frying, and I’d cut a pineapple into bite-sized chunks. I couldn’t understand how Dominic had stocked the boat so well in such a short amount of time, but I was thankful he had.

  With plates and mugs balanced on a tray, I negotiated the stairs and tiptoed into the master stateroom. I rested on the edge of the bed and watched Anya sleeping peacefully with her arms wrapped around my pillow. I traced my fingertips across her hip. Her skin was still pale, but the sun would soon turn her flawless Eastern European skin to a golden brown.

  “What took so long?” She stretched her arms and yawned.

  “I’m sorry to have kept you waiting, my czarina.”

  “No! I am now American girl. Never czarina.”

  “My apologies. I’m sorry to have kept you waiting, my American princess.”

  “Even I know you do not have princess in America.”

  “Maybe not, but I have one on this boat. Now eat up, princess. We have a big day ahead of us.”

  She stuck out her bottom lip. “But why must we leave honeymoon place? I like it here, and I think you like also.”

  I was surprised by her affection for the anchorage. “Oh, I love being here with you, but we have to get to Jekyll Island. Perhaps we’ll have a real honeymoon here someday.”

  “Someday?” She raised her eyebrows.

  We drank our coffee and fed each other pieces of pineapple. “I’m going to check the weather. Would you like more coffee?”

  “No,” she said. “I will come with you to see weather. I must learn to be American sailor girl.”

  Remembering what Dr. Richter had said about teaching her to sail and dive and eat chili dogs at a ball game, I complied. If she wanted to learn to sail, I’d gladly be her teacher.

  I showed her how to pull up the weather forecast and how to use the chart plotter. “This is where we are now. We’re going to Jekyll Island, which is up here,” I said, pointing to the barrier islands of Georgia.

  “Why are we going there?” she asked.

  “Do you remember when your father told us to head for the place I first met Aegis?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, that’s where I saw Aegis for the first time. That’s where your father and some of his old friends recruited me into this life—this life that led me to you. It’s a beautiful island, and you’ll love it. It’s off the coast of Georgia.”

  I had taken Anya to meet Dr. Richter in Athens, Georgia before we’d embarked on the mission that sent Aegis to the bottom of the ocean. That’s where she learned Dr. Richter was her father and where her decision to defect had been solidified.

  “I will never forget your Georgia, Chase, and now is my Georgia also.”

  I continued the lessons. “We’ll be sailing north with the Gulf Stream, so we’ll probably make fourteen knots along the route.”

  She blurted out, “Three hundred fifty miles at fourteen knots means twenty-five hours to get there. Is simple mathematics, yes?”

  “Yes.” I was impressed. “But I don’t want to sail for a solid twenty-five hours. That would mean we’d have to take turns sleeping while the other stood watch. Until you’re comfortable handling the boat alone, we’ll stick to daytime sailing and anchoring at night.”

  “Chase, is only twenty-five hours. Any person can stay awake twenty-four hours.”

  “Yes, you’re right, but it’s not that simple. The wind will not be as strong at night, and the further north we go, the slower the Gulf Stream will be, so we can’t make fourteen knots all the way.”

  “Okay,” she admitted. “I have much to learn.”

  “So do I.”

  She refilled our coffee mugs and waited for me to decide where we would anchor next. Instead of making the decision myself, I pulled her chair toward the navigation station and showed her how to find anchorages and measure distances on the chart plotter.

  “Let’s see if you can find us a good place to anchor tonight.”

  She scrolled through the chart plotter up the east coast of Florida. “I see Cape of Canaveral. That is where your NASA spaceships are.”

  I smiled. “Yes, you found it. That’s where we launch the space shuttle and other rockets carrying satellites and all sorts of other things into space.”

  “We will see this place, and your spaceships, yes?”

  “We’ll see the island, but I don’t think there’ll be any spaceships.”

  “And we will see also Disney World and White House and Liberty Statue and Great Canyon?”

  I was amused by her excitement of experiencing America. “Well, we’ll see all of those places together, but not on this trip.”

  “On honeymoon we will see them.”

  Desperate to get the navigation lesson back on track, I said, “So, where are we going today?”

  She busied herself with scanning the chart again. “I think we will go to Fort Pierce, but if cannot, we will go to Saint Lucie Inlet.”

  “That’s a great plan,” I told her.

  We left the main salon and ventured into the cockpit where I was going to start the engines, but she stopped me. “No, let me do it.”

  I loved her eagerness to learn, so I tried to stay out of her way, giving only small suggestions. She started the engines, raised the anchor, and motored out of the anchorage. With very little help from me, she unfurled the headsail and shut down the engines.

  I showed her how to trim the sail for maximum efficiency, and then how to program the chart plotter and set the autopilot.

  “That’s it,” I said. “Now, all we have to do is watch for other boats for seven or eight hours and keep her pointed toward Fort Pierce.”

  “I am sailor now,” she proclaimed proudly.

  “Well, you’re a downwind sailor now. We’ll sail into the wind at some point, and that’s a little different, but we’ll get to that in time.”

  She repeated, “I am sailor now.”

  I realized my mistake. “Yes, you are a sailor now.”

  The day turned out to be a sailor’s dream. The waves were less than three feet, the wind was strong and consistent, and the boat performed flawlessly. We saw two cruise ships outbound from Fort Lauderdale, headed for The Bahamas, and Anya feared we mi
ght collide. I assured her we’d stay well away from the cruise ships, even though, technically, the larger ships were supposed to give way to a sailboat.

  “That is silly rule. We are tiny bug, and ships are big and powerful. Rule should be we stay away from them.”

  “I agree, but there are reasons for the rules. We’re less maneuverable than powerboats, so that’s what the rule is based on.”

  “Is still silly rule,” she insisted.

  I conceded. I wasn’t going to win that one.

  “I have read about cruising ships. They are luxurious, yes? Is that right word, luxurious?”

  “Yes, that’s exactly the right word. I’ve never been on a cruise ship,” I admitted, “but I’d like to go. How about you?”

  “Yes. We can do that on honeymoon also with Liberty Statue and Great Canyon.”

  Again, with the honeymoon talk.

  “Hey, American girl. It’s called the Statue of Liberty and the Grand Canyon.”

  “Yes,” she said, “but is still called honeymoon.”

  The wind and current were a little better than forecast, so we made Fort Pierce Inlet well before sunset. Anya proved as competent at anchoring the big cat as she had been at weighing the anchor earlier that morning. I led her through the procedure of allowing plenty of room for the boat to swing around on the anchor chain when the wind or tide changed directions. Then I taught her to back down on the anchor with both engines at full power, in reverse, to seat the anchor solidly in the bottom. She mastered the skills in no time.

  “Is nothing hard for you?” I asked.

  She gave me a blank look. “What do you mean?”

  “Everything seems so easy for you to learn. Isn’t anything difficult?”

  She bit at her bottom lip then motioned for me to sit down. She sat on my lap, ran her fingers through my hair, and curled her long legs beneath her.

  I could see there was something troubling her, and I wanted her to tell me everything so I could help.

  “What is chili dog?”

  “What?”

  “I want to eat chili dog at ball game with you, but I do not know what it is.”

  I laughed. “Words can’t do a chili dog justice. You have to experience one for yourself. I promise you’ll love it.”