“Joe, we have no boat, you took it,” Nikki protested.
“That’s going to be a problem, but you’ll have to work that out yourself. I’ll see you in two days. Be ready!”
John and Nikki looked at each other and simultaneously said, “Where are we going to get a clean boat in a day?”
Nikki thought for a long moment, then said, “There are lots of go-fast boats here, so let’s steal one and use it for the trip and put it back.”
“That might work. Do you know of such a boat?” John asked.
“No, but Rita does. She knows who has one, and who is leaving town.”
“Do you trust her, and can you count on her?”
“She’ll get up shortly, and we’ll ask her.”
Nikki called Rita, who came over for coffee. They all sat down and talked about the boat deal. Nikki and John had agreed in advance to offer her one hundred thousand dollars to do the deal.
“For a hundred thousand, I’ll do it,” Rita agreed and said she’d get back to them by the end of the day with the details.
The rest of the day went by, and most of the night. They broke down and called Rita on her cell phone. All she would say was she was working on it.
In the morning over coffee, John said, “We can’t wait any longer. We have to make a move today, to get a boat for tomorrow’s trip.”
They went in Nikki’s boat to find a boat to steal the next night. During the day they scouted out boats they could take from the slip without the owners being able to hear them. When they got home they took the car to the address to check things out.
One of the houses looked as if the owners only came down on the weekends. It was perfect, but the boat was a thirty-foot center console. It had two outboards, but it was old.
They went back home and had a couple of drinks, waiting for the Chief to show up.
When he got there and went through everything, he said, “Don’t worry about the boat, there will be no one watching for runners tonight. They are all busy trying to find Mike. It will be an easy and safe trip. Call when you’re ready to load tonight,” he said as he left.
John and Nikki got ready for their trip, stocking up on extra gas and oil, in case it was empty. They left about eleven o’clock, planning on being at the other boat about midnight. When they got to the destination, Nikki shut her boat off and drifted to the outer dock. John got aboard to hotwire and untie the other boat. Then Nikki towed it out to start it, and check the gas. They had a long trip, with their lights off, so John followed Nikki and her GPS.
In a couple of hours they got to the spot where they were supposed to meet the service runner who was already there. Nikki pulled up first and loaded, then it was John’s turn.
They headed back to the dock. They had just entered the cut when they noticed that cops were at the dock where they’d stolen the boat. They kept going with their lights off, staying at a slow speed.
When they got to the marina, there was no place to berth one of the boats. So Nikki called the Chief and told him that one of the boats would be in between her houseboat and the sea wall.
They put her boat back in its slip, and went to the sea wall to help the Chief unload. Nikki took the dock cart full of bundles, to the pick-up truck, making five or six trips until the exchange was over.
John and Nikki decided to take the money back to her place and have a drink before taking the stolen boat out to turn it loose.
After a bit John went out to jump into the stolen boat. To his surprise, there was a man in the boat stealing the engines, or trying to steal them.
“Hey, asshole,” John yelled. “What are you doing?” The car behind him took off, and the man jumped up on the sea wall. John took several swings and kicks at him, but he ran off.
When Nikki got there, the controls were all off the motors, and they could see it wouldn’t run. They had no choice but to tow it out to the cut and set it adrift.
Back at Nikki’s, they made breakfast and some coffee in to-go cups, and after eating, headed to the dock. The only person they saw was Don, who was making coffee on the back of his boat, so they went aboard. Soon Rick, Criss, and Mark showed up, too.
As they sat and drank coffee of all assorted kinds, they made small talk.
“I heard a boat come in around four this morning,” Mark said. “Sounded like it parked. Did anyone else hear it?”
Everyone said no or shook their heads. Nikki knew that it must have been her and John but pretended as if they heard nothing. The talk went to the DEA agents that were killed, and Mike. Again they acted as if they didn’t know anything about it.
After an hour, John and Nikki headed back to her place. Nikki asked, “When is our next trip? Or do you know?”
“The Chief said it would be three or four weeks. That’s all I know.”
“Well, let’s count what we have and hide it.” As they were doing that the phone rang, it was Rita saying she would stop over in a couple of hours.
CHAPTER 24
When Rita got there she took a drink and said, “I have a boat.”
“You must be kidding, that was two days ago,” John said.
“I went through hell to get the right boat,” Rita said angrily, “and I screwed the guy, too.”
“Hey, I told you that we needed the boat the next night, not five days later. You’re too late.”
“Well, it’s all arranged now, and he’s in on my end,” Rita argued.
“You mean he knows what we are doing?” asked Nikki.
“Not exactly; he just knows that he has to bring the boat.”
“You’re kidding, aren’t you?” John exclaimed. “You must be kidding. Are you telling me some drunk at a titty bar knows who we are, and what we do? Oh, shit, we’re screwed now!” John turned to Nikki.
“Rita, he doesn’t know our names, does he?” Nikki asked.
“No, he just knows it’s somewhere on the dock.”
“Oh, that will be real hard to figure out, Rita,” John said. “Call him, and let’s meet here, tonight.”
“His number is back at my place.”
“Go call him and set it up. Then come right back.”
When Rita left, John said, “You know we’re dead when Sam, or the Chief, finds out. We are dead.”
“John, let’s wait until we meet him.”
“Nikki, he hangs out in a titty bar, giving girls ones for lap dances. He can’t wait to go there with ten grand or so. God, we’re screwed, we’re dead. What are we going to do now?”
“Let’s just meet him tonight and see where we stand.”
Night came, and Rita showed up with the guy. John started the conversation to get him relaxed and then asked some questions.
Nikki and John could see he was dumber than a rock, superficial and flashy. He wore one stupid earring and a short ponytail, a style that went out ten years ago. His face looked like a tackle box, pierced with studs, earrings, and posts.
When Rita and her guy left, Nikki looked at John. “Don’t say it. I know. I’ll figure something out, tonight, and I’ll take care of it.”
Later that night, before Rita had to go to work, Nikki went over and talked to her. She setup a deal where Rita would get the guy to bring his boat to the dock the next night at midnight. He would pick up Nikki and Rita for the trip. Rita was to tell him that he must tell no one, no one at all.
Rita had the day off, so she and Nikki were set. When the guy showed up, they said they were meeting at the trough. It took an hour to get to where the water was over a mile deep. Once there, Nikki shut the boat down, and they waited for the service runner who wasn’t coming.
After a few beers, Rita rubbed her crotch and asked, “Do you want some of this while we wait?”
He could not turn down the offer and crawled on his knees to where Rita was. Just as he got there he heard Nikki moving around, and turned, thinking she was going to join them. As he looked up he caught a glance of the ball peen hammer completing an ark that ended at his forehead.
He went down like he was made of rock, and both girls went to work tying his legs together, then to the anchor.
Just as they were going to put him over the side, he came to life, grabbing Rita’s collar and her arm. His head was bleeding from the strike, a flap of skin peeled back from his nose to the middle of his head. Nikki picked up the hammer, then took several swipes at his bloody head, but he managed to block each one. He got a choke hold on Rita, but Nikki hit his elbow, and he let go as she took the skin off his elbow, too. Blood came through his shirt sleeve.
Then Nikki picked up the anchor, which was bound to his feet, and threw it overboard. The sudden weight pulled him across the floor of the boat and almost over the side. He held on tight to Rita, who was also pulled to the edge. He went into the water, still holding onto Rita who was half in and half out of the water.
The man grasped the side of the boat with one hand, the other holding tight to Rita. Nikki hit him several times on the one hand with the ball peen hammer. He let go of Rita and clung to the side of the boat with both bloody hands. Nikki kept hitting his hands until he let go. He went under, sinking out of sight.
Rita pulled herself into the boat, and the two collapsed, out of breathe and covered with blood. Nikki threw the hammer overboard.
“I’ll get the bucket so we can clean up,” Nikki said. It took a good half hour to get the blood out of the boat
About twenty miles into the trip back, Rita started to scream and scream and point to the side of the boat where he had been.
Nikki stopped the boat. “What’s wrong?” she yelled at Rita. “Shut up! What’s wrong?”
“Look at that!” Rita pointed to fingers stuck in the railing of the boat. Nikki walked over, picked the fingers loose with her bare hand and threw them overboard.
“Now, calm down,” she said to Rita, “We have to get back. We have to put this boat back. We’ll get things cleaned up before there are people on the dock.”
When they got to within a half mile of the dock by the cut, they pulled into shore, got out and turned the boat loose.
They walked back to the dock where they went to their respective apartments to clean up, wash their clothes, and change. Nikki woke John up to tell him all went well and they had nothing to worry about.
“Only Rita,” he said. Nikki went out on the dock to see if all was well, then she went to Rita’s apartment to go over their story, to make sure they sang from the same sheet of music.
After talking to Rita to get things straight, Nikki went back to her apartment where John was making coffee. She again told him they had nothing to worry about.
“John, let the coffee make itself, and let’s go back to bed.” About nine they got up for the day and went about their jobs.
When Nikki saw Rick and Criss sitting on the back of the boat drinking virgin orange juice, Criss, of course, had the purse with her pulled tight across her shoulder as usual.
Nikki joined them on the back of the boat with their coffee. Rick and Criss talked about where they had been, and how life was since they’d returned. They had spent a year in the Bahamas, seeing the sights and had been to the usual places that retired people with boats go.
Mark came up out of dock four, so Nikki had to go see what was up.
“Something hit the corner of the flooding dock and put a hole in it,” Mark told her. “I’m trying to stop the leak. It must have been that boat everyone heard the other night, about two or three in the morning.”
“Do you need the diver?” Nikki asked
“No, I think I can take care of it myself.”
“Okay,” said Nikki. She started to walk off, then turned to Mark and said, “Speaking of taking care of things, when are you going to take care of this?” She made a gesture to her body, then went back to the Hattaras to finish her coffee.
Everyone was topside, and Criss was still holding on to her purse like there was no tomorrow. She always had a paperback romance novel with her, reading one after the other.
Nikki thought to herself, ‘I bet they haven’t been laid by each other in ten years, or more, out of the thirty or so they have been married.” Nikki believed that so many people spend their lives in quiet desperation, working at jobs they hate and raising kids to give them a start at life. “You pay the house off, then retire, move on a boat,” Nikki thought, “then you die.” No adventure or excitement, and no sex, and it’s over. She decided she had chosen the right path, at least for her.
She went back up to join everyone on the boat where she took a seat next to Rick. Later, Criss got up to see about hors d’oeuvres.
“Don’t say anything,” Rick said, “let me guess; the purse is on her shoulder and the paperback is in her hand. If she would put one or the other down once in a while, she might have room for sex, but instead I have to be entertained elsewhere.”
“Rick, I think you have had too much to drink,” Nikki said.
“That’s maybe true, but we’re retired and I worked for thirty five years for what? I worked for her, for the kids, for the house, and for the jewels in that purse.”
That made Nikki’s ears perk up. Did he just say jewels in the purse, not insurance papers? She got closer to him, so she and only she could hear what he had to say next.
“If I only knew fifteen or twenty years ago, that there wouldn’t be any love or sex, and never would be, not even when we retired on a boat.”
“You mean there are jewels in the purse? How much are they worth and what kind?”
“Millions! And mostly diamonds,” Rick replied.
“Let’s talk later,” she said and went to make another drink and see if Criss needed any help, but most of all to move away from Rick before he said too much.
She and John and the rest partied most of the day and night away and then they went back to her place. They made several more drinks before John passed out. Nikki knew it was no use to wake him up so she got out the toot and did a few lines and turned the CD player up some. After dancing by herself, she did more lines, and freshened up her drink, then went out on the dock to see what was going on. To her surprise, it was quiet and dark.
She knew exactly where to go.
Mark opened the door a few seconds after Nikki knocked. She had her drink and baggie in hand.
“Come in,” he said, greeting her with a kiss that lasted until her drink started to spill down his back.
“Got a mirror?” she asked, holding up the baggie.
“Always, and always loaded.”
“Well, move that shit over. This is from Barenquica,” and she poured a healthy portion on the mirror and made four lines.
After they had the lines and made more drinks, they started kissing and taking off clothes. They made their way down the hall of the Bluewater to the master suite where they fell on his unmade bed.
It was a moment they’d both been waiting for, and they started by exploring one another’s nude bodies. They kissed, they sucked, they caressed until they could stand it any longer and allowed themselves to climax simultaneously.
Afterward, they lay together, panting for breath.
“Well, I guess that answers that,” Nikki finally said.
“Answers what?” Mark inquired.
“Well, I guess we found out it works, and so does your tongue. Very well, in fact,” Nikki replied.
“What about John?” Mark said.
“Oh, he wouldn’t mind. In fact, if he was up, he would be with us in bed. John loves sex of all kinds, all colors, and all flavors. He just loves sex. And speaking of John, I’ll get dressed and go home,” she responded.
After a long goodbye kiss, Nikki headed for home where she discovered that John had gone to bed. She got undressed and under the covers.
John kissed her hello. “Where have you been?”
“I was down having drinks and sex with Mark, because you passed out,” Nikki answered.
“Sorry, I drank too much. Did you have fun?” he asked.
“Yes, but i
t would have been more fun with the three of us.”
After sleep, coffee, and getting dressed for the day, they went downtown to do some errands and stopped at the café to have lunch. The place was full and the Chief was in a booth with several of his men. As they passed booths, people called out to Nikki, asking how things were down at the marina.
Back in the car, John turned to Nikki. “See, I told you Rita was going to be trouble. She will tell people at work, they’ll tell people, and they’ll tell people. Then one night the Chief will take us fishing.”
When they got back to the dock Rita wasn’t home yet. Nikki told John she would talk to her in the morning. They were both in a twilight sleep when Rita got home, so Nikki went over to talk to her. When she got there, there was another stripper with her having a drink. So Nikki went back home and thought she would talk to her tomorrow. About two o’clock, after she saw the other girl leave, Nikki went over to talk to Rita.
Rita said that nobody knew about the deal, the hidden millions, or the boat owner they killed. “Do you really think I would tell anybody,” Rita said, “and take the chance of losing my two million dollars, or going to jail for the rest of my life for a man that’s a mile underwater?”
“You would be really stupid to do that,” Nikki agreed. Then she left and went home.
“I still don’t trust her,” John said, “or anything she has to say. She’s got to go.” John wouldn’t let it go. He kept talking about Rita, and her mouth, and insisted that sooner or later she would tell people what they were into. They went out on the dock, drinks in-hand. Lots of people were there talking, and having a drink. Nikki could tell John was thinking about Rita, and she could also tell that it was going to be trouble.
CHAPTER 25
They stayed on the dock for a couple of hours before heading back to Nikki’s. John brought up the Rita problem again, then Nikki decided to make them a drink, and put on some CD’s.
Smugglers 4 - South Beach Heat Page 21
