“Her sister’s in another hospital. Parents are out of state. Tanya here is her niece—and she’s a minor.”
“She’ll have to sign the treatment papers, then. You can witness. Oh, we do have chaplains here. Or we can call her own, if you prefer.”
Jordan and the doctor both looked at Tanya.
“Get her a chaplain,” Tanya said, not taking her eyes off Aurora.
The doctor picked up the phone and dialed the chaplain’s office, requesting the Protestant chaplain for a nondenominational prayer service. “Someone’s on the way.”
She placed her hand kindly on Tanya’s shoulder. The gesture gave Tanya no comfort, but she allowed it nonetheless.
“The technician will stay and monitor the chamber,” the doctor said, gesturing toward a corpsman sitting at the chamber controls. “I’ll be back to check on your aunt later.”
Jordan took the doctor’s place by Tanya’s side. They both stood in silent vigil.
“This is all my fault,” Tanya finally said, her voice hoarse. “First my mom, now Rory.”
“Hey, I’m the one who ordered the helicopter to hover over the drop site—and that caused the wreckage to fall.”
“It’s still all my fault.”
Jordan draped an arm around the teen’s shoulders and pulled her close. “Think good thoughts, Tanya. Aurora needs them.”
Tanya’s hands splayed wide. She went to touch the clear glass of the chamber’s porthole near her aunt’s face, but the uniformed technician shook his head. “Stay behind the yellow safety line, please.”
Abruptly, Tanya drew back. “Do you think she’s in pain?”
“No, not now.”
“What about earlier? How bad was it earlier?”
Jordan shrugged, his arms still around her. “A broken ankle will hurt, Tanya.”
“I’m not talking about her ankle. I’m talking about the bends. I know about diving, Jordan. I’ve dived myself. How bad was it?”
Jordan said nothing, but the expression on his face gave Tanya her answer. Bad. Very bad.
She didn’t know what she would’ve done if the chaplain—another woman—hadn’t walked in. Older and shorter, she, too, wore a naval uniform, but one of the rank insignias on her collar points was replaced with a tiny gold cross.
“I’m Chaplain Myers,” she began in a soft voice. “And you must be Miss Atwell. Can I call you Tanya?”
“Call me whatever you want, Preacher. Just please pray for my aunt.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
“I’M GOING TO TALK with the chaplain, okay, Jordan?” Tanya asked.
Jordan nodded, his attention on Aurora. Tanya accompanied Chaplain Myers toward the clergy offices attached to the hospital chapel.
“I never saw a woman preacher before,” Tanya said as the two of them stepped into an empty elevator. “At least, not one in a military uniform.”
“Oh, there’re a few of us around.”
“What do I call you?” Tanya asked. Her parents attended church off and on, but Tanya rarely went with them. In fact, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d bothered.
“You can call me Chaplain or Lieutenant. Or if you want, my first name is Jill.”
Tanya hesitated, then decided she should go with the formal approach. “Well...Chaplain...do you have cops here at the hospital?”
“We have military police.” The elevator doors whooshed open at the crowded ground-floor level. Chaplain Jill didn’t speak until they were walking along the sidewalk and had privacy again. “Why do you ask?”
Tanya took a deep breath. “I need to turn myself in,” she blurted out. “But I don’t know what to say when I do. I don’t want to get other people in trouble, but I don’t want to lie anymore, either. I thought maybe...” Tanya stopped on the sidewalk and with her foot smashed a half-crumpled palm frond that had fallen from above.
“You could talk to me first.”
Tanya nodded.
“That’s what I’m here for.”
She lifted her head and stared at the military uniform. “Do you have to tell the military police everything I say?”
“Counseling sessions are kept confidential. Unless you plan on blowing up the White House or kidnapping our admiral.” She smiled as she spoke.
Tanya didn’t smile back.
Jill nudged the palm frond into the gutter. “Come on,” she said kindly. “We’ll go to my office to talk.”
* * *
BY THE TIME Tanya finished her story, even Jill was shocked. She’d counseled sailors and marines, men and women whose jobs often encompassed tragic consequences. Yet this girl had—on her own—practically created an international incident and endangered her whole family.
Jill checked her notes. According to Tanya, a Mexican family who remained nameless and two adults whom Tanya also refused to name had helped spring her and her mother from jail. The aunt—Aurora—had somehow ended up with the bends, and she could still die of it; this had apparently happened while she was rescuing the girl’s father. Jordan, the partner, kept vigil. Jill suspected Jordan and Aurora were somehow involved in the jailbreak, but Tanya refused to confirm this suspicion. A bishop of the San Diego Mission sheltered the Mexican family, while the girl’s father, Gerald, waited by the mother’s bedside at a civilian hospital.
“And there are two dead divers and two who escaped?” Jill asked.
Tanya nodded. “They tried to kill Jordan by beating him with baseball bats and tossing him off the pier—at least, Jordan says they’re the ones. Rory rescued him. But then they tried to kill Rory, only that backfired. They’re lying on the bottom of the ocean. Two escaped with a boat. Jordan said he was going to report them all to the Coast Guard. I don’t know if he did that yet or not, or if he said anything about me—or how I caused all this.”
“Your father—Gerald—was released from jail legally, you say?”
“Yeah, but he was kidnapped by Flores right after. Flores is the boss of those same men who tried to kill Jordan.”
Names and crimes and plots spun in Jill’s head. She listed them with military precision on her little notepad. “Okay. Is there anything else you haven’t told me—other than some specific names?”
“Rory said that Flores burned her boat, Neptune’s Bride, in the harbor. The Oceanside Harbor Police have suspected arson for a while, apparently. So did Donna Diamond.”
Jill reached for her pen again. “Donna?”
“My aunt’s P.I. friend. Only her last name isn’t really Diamond.”
“Do you know her number?”
“It’s in the phone book...under the Diamond Detective Agency.”
“Anything else?”
“I don’t want to get high anymore. I’ve got too much going on as it is.”
Tanya pulled a tissue from the box Jill always kept in her office. Jill noticed the girl’s eyes were dry. Tanya twisted the tissue into little shreds.
She pushed the box of tissues toward the girl. “A few last questions.”
“Aren’t we done yet?” Tanya complained, then blushed. “Sorry, Reverend. Ask away.”
“Question number one. Do you feel like hurting yourself?”
“No.”
“Having any suicidal thoughts?”
The girl shook her head.
“Question number three. Would you like me to get you a lawyer?” Jill watched Tanya blink, then grow pale. “I think you’re going to need one, sweetheart,” she told her quietly.
“Why bother? I know I’m going back to jail. I just don’t want to go until I know my family’s gonna be okay. And I won’t give you any more specifics. I won’t get anyone in even more trouble, especially my mother or my aunt. If they live. If they don’t, my dad will probably kill me. Either way, makes no difference.” Tanya shrugged and dropped the shredded tissue into the trash can. Bits of fluff drifted slowly down.
“Call the cops, tell them it was all my fault and let’s just get this over with, okay?” Tanya reached for another t
issue and began shredding it, too.
“All right,” Jillian said softly. “Before I go, I have to tell you that you are entitled to privacy with regard to what you’ve told me. However, I think I can do much for you if you let me share that information with others. If you don’t want me to disclose anything, that’s your right, too. But frankly, child, I don’t think you can hide for much longer—even if I do remain silent.”
Tanya shrugged. “Whatever. I don’t care what you tell them.”
“All right. Let me talk to some people. This may take a while. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.”
* * *
JILL CLOSED HER office door behind her and stepped out into the main reception area. Her yeoman lifted his head as she stopped before his desk.
“Can I help you, ma’am?”
“I’ll need a social worker down here from Juvenile, someone from Legal to represent said juvenile, and the MPs. Tell them we’ll probably be notifying the provost marshal’s office on this one, and have them send me two female guards—one of them with some smarts and rank. We’re dealing with international violations, two deaths, illegal drugs—and that’s just for starters.”
“Anything else, Chaplain?”
“Yeah. Get the phone number for Mission San Diego for me, then get the C.O. on the line. We’ve got a boatload of trouble here, Yeoman. Time for reinforcements.”
* * *
THE TECHNICIAN LEFT the room to take a quick bathroom break, leaving Jordan alone with Aurora. Jordan took advantage of the privacy to step beyond the yellow line on the floor and get closer to the tempered glass portal separating him from her.
She looks so still, Jordan thought. So pale.
Jordan refused to think the unthinkable. He ventured to touch the glass near her cheek, carefully avoiding any sudden moves that could startle her.
I wish you’d wake up, Aurora. I don’t have any answers for you about Tanya or Dorian, but I could tell you I love you again. I want to use my voice this time, not a marker on an underwater tablet. We’ve been so busy looking out for everyone else that we haven’t had time for each other....
Jordan heard the footsteps of the technician outside the door. He didn’t bother to step back behind the line until the technician tapped on his shoulder, and only then did he retreat— reluctantly—to the visitor’s chair against the wall.
The doctor returned to check on Aurora and murmured guarded reassurance to Jordan.
“If there’s no change then say so,” Jordan said bluntly. “I’m a diver myself. Don’t sugarcoat it.”
The doctor refused to commit herself to anything and left.
Tanya...where is that girl? She should be back by now.... He’d seen her walk off with the chaplain over half an hour ago. For the first time, he understood why anyone would ever want to leave family behind. No wonder Aurora bolted with a clear conscience. Look at Tanya. How could anyone live a normal life with such confusion...with no family unity? The repercussions that one teen had created were incredible. Despite it all, Aurora had come back to her family, stood beside them—and paid this price.
The door behind him unexpectedly swung open again. Two military police stood at attention. The chamber tech lifted his head from his charting, as surprised as Jordan.
The taller male MP addressed Jordan. “Mr. Castillo? We have some questions for you.”
“Fine,” Jordan said. “Go ahead.”
“Not here, sir,” the shorter but higher-ranking female MP said.
“I don’t want to leave her.”
“Sorry, sir, but you have no choice.” The woman’s seriousness broke through Jordan’s preoccupation with Aurora as the man approached his side. “You’ll have to come with us.”
Jordan rose. “Tell the doctor to call me if there’s any change,” he said to the technician. “I’ll be at—what extension?” he asked the MP.
The male MP recited the phone number to the chamber tech, who dutifully wrote it down.
“Tell her I’ll be back as soon as I can,” Jordan said.
The tech nodded.
“Tell her now, with the mike. So she can hear you.”
The technician slowly reached for the microphone that enabled those on the outside to communicate with the patient inside.
“Never mind, I’ll do it myself.” Jordan took the mike from the tech’s hand. “Aurora, it’s me—Jordan. I have to take care of some business, but I’ll be back as soon as I can, okay? I called Donna when the doctor was with you. She’s heading over. She’ll keep you company until I return.”
“This way, sir.”
Jordan stole one last glance at Aurora. “I’ll see you later. Just rest up, now.” He passed the mike back to the tech and turned to the MPs. “Okay, let’s go.”
* * *
AURORA HEARD JORDAN’S voice from far, far away. Her thinking was confused, unclear, and her body felt weighted under a heavy layer that pressed upon her from all sides. She couldn’t move, couldn’t even open her eyes, but she could hear.
Jordan? Where are you?
Frightening memories surged back into her consciousness, causing such panic and disarray that she couldn’t tell what was real and what wasn’t.
If only I could open my eyes. Jordan, don’t go! Jordan?
She strained to listen, but heard nothing. She strained to open her eyes, but they refused to respond to her command. She felt totally isolated in her private darkness, paralyzing heaviness and silence.
I don’t want to be alone again, she vowed. Never again. But her vow didn’t change her solitary state. She no longer heard Jordan’s voice. Finally, the heaviness won again, and she drifted back into unconsciousness, her last thought the memory of Jordan’s voice.
* * *
GERALD SAT BESIDE his wife’s bed, his two hands holding one of hers. Donna had left for the naval hospital to be with Aurora, while he’d chosen to remain at his wife’s side. The doctors had pronounced her finally on the mend. Dorian would remain in intensive care another day before being moved to a regular ward, but for now it seemed the worst of the virus was over. Only the secondary infection still needed treatment.
“If your wife had come to us just one hour later, I don’t know if we could have saved her,” the doctor had said. “Your sister-in-law made the right call. She couldn’t have survived much longer with just simple clinical care.”
Now Gerald waited for Dorian to wake as he remembered all the trouble he and his family had survived, thanks to Aurora. Aurora—the cocksure sister-in-law he’d never liked, the sister-in-law Dorian had never forgiven. The woman Gerald had blamed for Tanya’s rebelliousness.
Gerald felt heartily ashamed of himself. Aurora’s actions weren’t responsible for Tanya’s problems. Tanya was responsible, and so was he. Gerald had never been able to handle his wild daughter because he’d never taken time to build a relationship with her. He was always working, working, working and leaving Dori alone with a daughter whose forceful personality needed the guidance of both a strong mother and a present father.
He’d conveniently blamed his own failings on Aurora. Yet if it weren’t for Aurora, Dorian would be dead, Tanya still in jail and his company bankrupt. Aurora—whose own parents hadn’t bothered to give a talented yet stubborn child the guidance she needed, either. They’d made no serious attempt to understand her. They’d let her run off, made too few efforts to retrieve her and moved away from home, severing any ties and any hope of a homecoming.
And he, Gerald, had continually dodged the problems he’d married as his in-laws’ problems, not his. Dorian’s bitterness over the past and his disdain for her family had hurt his marriage and wasted valuable time his daughter, Tanya, desperately needed.
Dorian had nearly lost her life and could still lose her sister. He felt like a failure as a husband, father and brother-in-law. As a family man. The woman he’d accused of having no concept of family had shown a better understanding of it than anyone could have guessed. She and Jordan Castillo,
who wasn’t even family, had done what Gerald should be doing.
Taking charge, doing the right thing and putting family...people...others first. What was he doing now? Sitting in his recuperating wife’s room, while Jordan took care of Aurora and Tanya.
Gerald rose to his feet. He kissed Dorian gently on the forehead, told the nurse he’d be at Balboa Hospital and called a cab. This time, the blame would rest where it belonged—on his shoulders, not Aurora’s. For once he would handle his family’s problems. He would check on his daughter and on his wife’s sister, take the burden off Jordan, and then...
Then he would call the police.
U.S.A. and Mexico
International Marine Border
THE COAST GUARD patrolled the dark waters of the Pacific, just as their Mexican counterparts patrolled theirs. Both sides were cooperating, jointly searching for the Mako and the two men, “Tom” and “Harry,” left alive from Flores’s original gang of four.
Aboard the Coast Guard ship, USS Salty Dog, the male security officer spoke to the female lookout.
“If they’re in these waters, they should be easy enough to find,” he said.
“Tell me about it,” she replied. “We had—what—two witnesses give us a description?”
“Four,” he corrected. “Two family members and two friends of the family. Good description of the boat crew, too.”
“Thankfully, these people know boats. The descriptions all match, for a change. It’ll make our job easier. Mexico thinks the boat was stolen from them and registered in our country. It’s going under the name Mako right now, but was originally registered as the Sea-Sawed.” She paused. “Sounds like smugglers to me.”
“Drugs, probably.”
“Not confirmed, but that’s usually what it is. I hope we find them before the Mexican government does,” the woman said. “I hear Mexican jails are the pits. Makes ours look like Club Med.”
“Too bad. Serves the dealers right,” said the man. “Though I’d rather Mexico found them this time. We won’t have to book them. I have a hot date tonight.”
“You bachelors.” The woman checked the radar, then raised her night-vision binoculars to her eyes again. “Well, I’m up for promotion. Finding this boat might just tip the scales in my favor. And Mexico nabbed the bad guys the last two times we did a joint search. We don’t want to look bad.”
Found at Sea Page 21
