Mac swung his right arm around his back in an attempt to retrieve the regulator. His first attempt missed, but his training held true, and on his second attempt he felt the hose against his bicep. Continuing the sweeping motion, the hose slid down his forearm until the regulator hit his hand. Slamming it into his mouth, he breathed deeply and assessed the situation.
Allowing Sloan to reach the surface would change everything. JC was armed. A stroke of morality, or a message from his gods, had kept him from killing Trufante and Pamela, but Mac could not count on the same benevolence to happen twice. Seeing his son in danger, there was little doubt he would use deadly force if necessary. Mac had to subdue Sloan before he reached the surface.
Sloan was halfway through the water column when Mac reached down for the speargun. Between setting the shaft and the bands, there was no time to load the speargun, so he just grabbed the shaft, which with lionfish still embedded on the tip. Invigorated by the air in his lungs, he finned hard for the surface. Sloan was within a few kicks of breaking through when Mac, using the shaft as a lance, hit Sloan’s leg with the remaining dorsal spines of the lionfish.
Sloan immediately grabbed for his leg, allowing Mac to reach out and pull him backwards. Again, Mac was surprised by his strength as Sloan pulled the fish from his leg and continued up. Mac had only seconds, and with the shaft back in his hand, kicked hard to the surface. He clearly could see the dorsal spines sticking out from Sloan’s leg. All that was left of the fish were the spines in the anal fin.
Sloan’s head broke the surface. Mac was only a second behind. He had to do something quickly before JC saw his son. Inflating his BC to give him leverage over the struggling man and, free of the resistance of the water, he was able to swing the shaft harder this time. Using the anal fin as his barb, he slammed the fish into Sloan’s neck. The reaction was instantaneous. Sloan slumped over and dropped below the surface.
Before he descended to retrieve Sloan, he scanned the surface and took a bearing on Ghost Runner. The struggle had disoriented Mac and he wasn’t sure which boat was where. Surfacing near Rusty’s boat would just deliver both of them to JC. Deflating his BC, Mac descended, hoping JC hadn’t noticed. Without the dive gear to weigh him down, Sloan was floating about halfway to the bottom.
Mac was within a dozen feet of him when he saw a dark spot in the water. Before he could react, it transformed into the rough shape of a shark. Attracted by the both men’s wounds, it was no surprise when a twelve-foot bull slammed into Sloan’s body. Mac didn’t watch as it backed away to prepare for its final assault. With blood streaming from his own shoulder, he was at risk as well.
Bolting for the surface, he stopped when he heard the unmistakable sound of a propeller cutting through the water. Slowing his ascent, he looked down in time to see the shark make another run at Sloan, then drag him toward open water. Seconds later they were gone.
Though the direction sound traveled was undetectable underwater, Mac had little doubt this was JC. He must have seen the struggle on the surface and followed Mac’s bubbles. Looking back at where Mac remembered it being anchored, he saw the bulb keel of the Surfari with its anchor line extending in front of it. Behind the sailboat he saw the steel hull of Rusty’s trawler heading directly toward Ghost Runner.
Staying ten feet underwater, Mac finned hard, having to cover the hundred yards he previously had transited with the scooter by his own power. With his shoulder aching, making the arm almost useless, the swim, and fight with Sloan, exhaustion was quickly overtaking him. He’d been here before though and putting his mind in another place, Mac fought the fatigue and reached his boat. Once underneath the hull, he surfaced on the side away from the direction where JC was approaching. Spitting the regulator out, he called for help. Three heads popped over the gunwale. JC’s boat was only a few yards away when he reached the deck, but Mac could see the confusion on the man’s face.
“Where’s Sloan?”
In between gasps of air, Mac told him what had happened, surprised to see what could be taken as a smile flash across his face, before his usual grimace returned.
Coming from the cabin, Pamela broke the silence. “What happened? I can feel something.”
Trufante went to her. “You okay? We was pretty worried there for a while.”
She looked at JC. “I forgive you. Whatever just happened, I think the gods are happy now.”
JC stared at the woman he had almost killed, wondering if she knew what had happened to Sloan or if she really did sense something. That feeling he’d had since meeting her was one of the reasons he had released her. If his years had taught him anything, it was that the gods chose their own intermediaries.
“Come here, young lady.” He motioned the barrel at her.
Pamela looked at Mac who nodded. Slowly she approached the gunwale.
“What do you know about the gods?”
Pamela was quiet for long enough that JC started wondering if he had misjudged her.
“Nothing really, but I can sense things about people sometimes.”
“And what is it you’re sensing about me now?”
“Seems that a black cloud has lifted from around you. One that’s been following you for years.”
She was right. He had felt it. With the devil child gone, maybe he was at peace. That all worked, but there was the matter of his burned-down building and the greedy FWC agent. “Thank you. Maybe we can talk later.” He had learned long ago that you had to be careful with someone with her ability.
“Sure, one thing, though,” Pamela said.
He looked at her, but when their eyes met, he looked away—a sure sign of her power. “Yes?”
“That foul mouth of yours needs to stop. You’re hurting your aura.”
This was getting too mystical for him, but he realized that since his son’s body had dissapeared, a curse word hadn’t fallen from his lips. “Maybe you’re right.” Dismissing her, he moved on to the rest of his problems.
“We’re tied together in this, Travis. That FWC agent has us both by the balls.” JC paused and looked at Pamela. “Excuse me, but you know what I mean.”
Travis moved closer. “Why don’t you put that gun away and we can talk.”
It had only been minutes since Sloan’s demise, but JC had never felt like this, or if he had, it was thirty years ago, before Sloan was born. He lowered the barrel, but kept his grip on the rifle. “Go on.”
“Payback is more your game than mine. I’m in if you figure a way to take Warner out—short of killing him.”
JC had seen the distress on Travis’s face when he realized he had killed Sloan. Mac had felt more remorse than JC himself. “Whatever happens, we’re gonna need some of whatever it is you found down there.”
“I’m good with that. Getting tired of being poor and I don’t guess you’re going to run off and tell the state.”
“For once we agree.”
Forty-One
They spent the next day pulling gold bars from the seabed. Wary about recovering the treasure so close to Fort Jefferson and the watchful—or prying—eyes, depending on your perspective, of the rangers there, Mac had pushed the crew. Several times, they stopped when park-service boats were sighted, but without the telltale blowers of many salvors, they just looked like two fishing boats tied up in a known anchorage.
It was quite a bit of work, requiring multiple dives from Mac, Mel, and Ned. Rusty and Trufante handled the heavy work on deck, while Mel and Pamela refilled tanks and guided hoses. By sunset, the fish boxes of each trawler were loaded with their shares of gold bars. Exhausted, and quite a bit wealthier, they relaxed with a beer almost as if they were friends. Gold has a way of either uniting or destroying people. At least for the present, it was working for the better.
The split had been without incident. They estimated the weight in gold at close to a thousand pounds, half of the ton that Van Doren had recovered, and along the lines of the split he had negotiated with Lafitte. Though it was probably cast i
n the 1700s, there were no mint marks or apparent provenance, making it even more valuable. Without any historical markings, it was just gold, and it looked damned pure. There would be no need to melt down or broker historical coins or jewelry.
JC seemed like a different man. He’d lost his bitter attitude, but his business acumen remained. Weighing the bars on a fish scale and tallying the results had kept a smile on his face all day.
One problem remained though, and when the thrill of the catch, or in this case the recovery, of the treasure wore off, the problem of Warner remained.
Mac finished his beer and rose to get another. “We still got to deal with Warner.”
“Son of a bitch needs to be taught a lesson.”
Even JC’s swearing had been moderated. With the black cloud gone, he was almost likable, but Mac knew he had to remain wary. “We could use some of the gold and set him up. Kind of like a sting.”
“He’s not the only one on the take in that group. They’d protect him like a mother protects her young,” JC said.
“Got a better idea?” Mac asked, looking at the group to see if anyone else needed a refill. Trufante raised his bottle. When Mac looked over at Mel, he knew the look on her face.
“Hear me out now before you two go off half-cocked.” Mel waited, glancing from Mac to JC. When they each nodded, she continued. “What are the options?“
Mac hated the lawyer tone she was using, but he knew how her mind worked and eventually she’d get where she was going. It wasn’t only him, and he smiled when a glance over at JC revealed a look of consternation on his face.
Mel continued. “So—kill him, maim him, get him fired, blackmail him, ruin him? Seeing a trend here?”
“Son of a bitch can’t come at us from the grave,” JC said.
Mel stared him down and continued. “Spin it backwards. This isn’t some third-world banana republic. He’s corrupt, but what’s the chance that his replacement will be, too? If he or she is, can we cut them at the knees before they can get into a position of power like Warner has? That guy knows where all the bodies are buried.”
“I get all that, but what are you thinking?” Mac asked.
“We promote him. He was crying about being stationed down here. You want to get rid of him—get rid of him.”
Mac watched JC as he processed her idea. It was unique and Mac instantly recognized that it would work for his situation, which was more of a personal animosity than the graft that Warner was taking from JC.
“Works for me. My biggest cash drain’s on the bottom of the sea. With the gold in my fish box and some other buried assets, I get me a cheaper wife, and I’m good.”
Mac saw Mel glance over at JC and assumed it was about his feelings for his son. Without knowing the circumstances, JC could be judged badly, but he and Mel both knew what Sloan was, and he, at least, had to agree.
“How do we go about this?”
“Leave that to me.”
With tired muscles and smiles on their faces, they turned in shortly after dark, ready to get an early start in the morning.
Anchoring in open water at night places you as close to nature as you can get. There is something primal about the feeling of helplessness if the ocean turns against you, but the night was quiet and uneventful. At dawn, the coffee brewers in each boat fired up, and the crews readied their boats for the trip back to Key West. The only problem was Rusty’s stubbornness, insisting on running his own boat. Mac totally understood and placed Ned and Mel in command of Ghost Runner. Trufante and Pamela would take the center console, anchored just offshore of the fort. He’d have to beg gas from the rangers there, but it wouldn’t be the first time they had to provide a boater with less-than-adequate math skills enough fuel to reach Key West. Once everything was squared away, he crossed over to the Surfari for the trip back.
With all of the gold aboard the trawlers, the boats agreed to stay within sight of each other for the trip back to Key West. They needn’t have bothered, as the weather was a fine as it gets this time of year. Between the low humidity and seventy-degree weather, once they started to run at the agreed-upon fifteen knots, it felt almost cold. By mid-afternoon, Key West was in sight, and they split up, all in agreement on what the next step was going to be.
Mac didn’t mind not having any gold aboard. In fact, wealth had always seemed a burden to him. He knew that money didn’t buy happiness, but he’d learned that it did buy freedom. That elusive feeling of being unencumbered by debt or favors owed. He didn’t “need” the money, but he started to think, as he monitored the boat’s systems and watched it sail itself, that it might not be a bad idea to hold onto his share of the riches this time.
The sailboat gave him an idea. He was familiar with how well it sailed, even under Sloan’s inept guidance. The boat’s hydraulic and electric-sail control systems for sheeting and furling the mainsail, self-tacking genoa, and bow sprit gave it a different vibe than traditional sailing, something that he frankly had no taste for. Running this ship was more like setting a trolling spread, something he was happy doing. It was more than the systems though; it was the range.
Mac and Mel had talked about traveling, but both knew they were more adventurous than most tourists. The only way for the two of them to travel was the hard way. Ghost Runner, for everything she was, lacked the range to cruise. To Mac, being limited by fuel capacity and consumption, and having to plan for stops to refill the tanks, was like riding a horse with a bit in its mouth. A one-tank trip was all he generally had the stomach for. The Surfari solved all those problems. She had a decent range as a motor vessel, but the sails gave the boat freedom.
When the breakwater protecting the harbor appeared, he had to start paying attention and dropped, or rather, self-furled the sails and increased the RPMs to compensate for the loss of wind power. Navigating around the point and into the harbor, he called the marina and requested a slip. Rusty had changed course to the east when the channel split, running around to his Atlantic side-anchorage on Stock Island. Trufante and Ned were behind him, and the three boats were assigned slips close to each other.
They met at the Half Shell for dinner, and to his surprise, they saw JC walk through the door. Though his attitude might have changed, he still wore his uniform white boots, allowing Pamela and Mel an uncommon shared moment. He saw them and moved toward the picnic table. Ned slid over and he sat.
“Everything’s safe and sound.”
Mac was startled that the frown usually etched in his face had changed to a smile.
“Unloaded that damned bar, too. Just gotta ditch the expensive wife, and I’m a free man.”
“Got the boat by the end of the dock,” Mac said.
“That’ll be yours now. The black cloud is gone, I don’t need anything to remind me of him.”
Mac was silent, until he felt Mel’s hand squeeze his thigh. “You mean it?”
“I do. Y’all put her to good use.”
About the Author
Always looking for a new location or adventure to write about, Steven Becker can usually be found on or near the water. He splits his time between Tampa and the Florida Keys - paddling, sailing, diving, fishing or exploring.
Find out more by visiting www.stevenbeckerauthor.com or contact me directly at
[email protected].
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Also By Steven Becker
Kurt Hunter Mysteries
Backwater Bay
Backwater Channel
Backwater Cove
Backwater Key
Backwater Pass
Backwater Tide
Backwater Flats (coming summer 2019)
Mac Travis Adventures
Wood’s Relic
Wood’s Reef
Wood’s Wall
Wood’s Wreck
Wood’s Harbor
Wood’s Reach
Wood’s Revenge
Wood’s Betrayal
Wood’s Tempest
Wood’s Fury
Tides of Fortune
Pirate
The Wreck of the Ten Sail
Haitian Gold
Shifting Sands
Will Service Adventure Thrillers
Bonefish Blues
Tuna Tango
Dorado Duet
Storm Series
Storm Rising
Storm Force
Wood's Fury Page 26
