The Black Bullet (Sean O'Brien mystery/thriller)

by Tom Lowe

  “Well fuck you very much,” Nick said toward the television. He shut off the sound. “What are we gonna do now? I feel like a wanted man, a freakin’ criminal, and we haven’t done anything wrong.”

  ***

  SUSAN SCHULMAN APPEARED live on CBS, in a news/talk show format that was broadcast nationally. Sean O’Brien, Nick Cronus, and Jason Canfield’s faces, along with the underwater photos O’Brien took, on television for the world to see. In addition to Schulman, the host’s guests included a U.S. senator to hypothesize, a retired Pentagon general to “put things in perspective,” a doomsday minister to lose perspective, and a Columbia University physicist to tell how nuclear bombs are made. O’Brien and Nick left, Nick swearing he’d never watch television news again.

  Dave poured a scotch and wondered how long it would take before he got the first phone call.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  The 11:00 p.m. newscasts had O’Brien, Nick and Jason’s face on every channel, the stories going viral and getting millions of views on the Internet. Five minutes later, O’Brien’s cell rang. It was Maggie Canfield. “Sean, Jason told me what happened, how his girlfriend managed to get and give those pictures of that submarine to the news media. I am so very sorry.”

  “It’s okay, Maggie.”

  “No, no it’s not okay. I know it’s late, and I feel bad for even asking, but can we talk? Not on the phone. Are you at the marina?”

  “Yes, I was just about to take Max for her walk.”

  “Maybe I could join you. I can be there in ten minutes.

  “We’ll be in the parking lot in front of the Tiki Bar.”

  ***

  AS HE OPENED THE SLIDING GLASS DOOR leading to Jupiter’s cockpit, he looked at his Glock lying near the boat’s helm. O’Brien picked up the gun, wedged it under his belt in the small of his back, and stepped out onto the dock with Max at his heels.

  The pier was damp from heavy dew. A vapor rose off the surface of the marina water and drifted eerily above the flickering security lamps, the sound of an eighteen-wheeler fading in the distance, the breakers across the road like a whisper from a seashell. O’Brien followed Max down the long dock. The soft flash of light from the lighthouse made him smile as it oddly looked like a firefly lost in the rising mist.

  Maggie Canfield was just getting out of her car when they approached. “Thank you for letting me join you and Max on your walk.”

  “It’s not always a walk, lots of stopping and starting, but it’s always an adventure, especially when ol’ Joe, the boatyard cat, is around.”

  Maggie walked beside O’Brien, both following Max as she sniffed beneath the coconut palm trees, the fronds rustling from a sudden breeze across the water. Maggie said, “Jason told me what happened, how you got your anchor caught on that submarine and found those things. He also let me know he promised you confidentiality. That trust was broken. Trust is something his father and I always tried hard to instill in our son. I’m sorry this got out of hand so quickly.”

  “Don’t sweat it, Maggie. Jason’s a good kid.”

  “What’s all this on the news about some kind of nuclear material? Is that what you found out there?

  “Maybe.”

  “Dear God ... what are you going to do?”

  “Where’s Jason now?”

  “He’s home in his room, playing video games on his computer. Why?”

  “Keep a close eye on him.”

  “Is my son in some kind of danger … please … after Frank’s death—”

  “Maggie, just tell Jason to be aware of his surroundings. If he even suspects he might be followed, call me immediately.”

  “I’m scared now. I haven’t felt this way in a long time.”

  “It’ll be fine. Hopefully, it will pass in a couple of days.”

  They stood next to one of the docks and watched a forty-two foot Chaparral enter the marina, its green and white running lights diffused in the mist above the water. Maggie turned toward O’Brien. “Jason is so looking forward to working on your boat with you this summer. Thank you, again, for giving him a greater sense of purpose.”

  “It’ll be a good summer. We need to catch fish, and leave sleeping subs alone.”

  Maggie smiled and pulled a loose strand of dark hair behind one ear. She watched Max a moment and said, “I’d love to have you over for a home-cooked meal. I can broil a great fish, that’s assuming your crew can catch a few.” She laughed and touched O’Brien’s arm.

  “I’d like that, Maggie.” He glanced toward the Tiki Bar. “Would you like a drink? I think we can make last call.”

  Maggie smiled, the revolving light from the lighthouse illuminating the tops of sailboat masts and the highest coconut palms. “I’d love that, but I better head home. I have an early day tomorrow, and I told Jason I’d be back soon.”

  “I’ll walk you to your car.”

  Max followed them, stopping only once across the parking lot, the sound or laughter coming from the Tiki Bar. At the car, O’Brien said, “Maggie, tell me what you know about Eric Hunter?”

  “Who?”

  “He said his name’s Eric Hunter.”

  “I don’t know anyone by that name.”

  “He said he knew you and your husband, Frank, knew him before the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole.”

  “Sean, I don’t know this man, and I never heard Frank mention his name. What’s going on?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Maggie studied him for a second, and then said, “I need to get home.” She leaned in and hugged O’Brien. He could smell the shampoo in her hair, the perfume she always wore twenty years ago, the way she used to hold him close, her head on his chest.

  She brushed her hand against the Glock. “What’s that on your back? Is it a gun?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you always wear a gun when you walk Max?”

  “Upon occasion.”

  “Just tell me one thing ... is my son safe with you?”

  “Yes.”

  She leaned up on her toes and kissed O’Brien on his cheek, and then she drove away. O’Brien watched her taillights swallowed in the fog. He heard the wail of a siren in the distance and saw the beam from the lighthouse rake across the rising mist, giving symmetry and animation to ghosts climbing the masts of sailboats.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  The following morning the FBI arrived at 8:00 a.m. Two men. One wore blue jeans, knit golf shirt, sneakers, and a nine millimeter on his hip. The other man dressed in a blue sports coat, kakis, and a button-down, white shirt. They walked toward Jupiter.

  Jason was hosing down Jupiter as O’Brien and Dave shared a pot of coffee on Gibraltar’s cockpit. O’Brien saw them approaching and said to Dave, “We have some company. Are they your guys?”

  “Not my guys, although I am retired, remember? However, one of our guys would be somebody who looked like a marine diesel mechanic. Those two have to be Homeland or FBI.”

  “I have a close friend, an agent in the Miami Bureau.”

  “Lauren Miles?”

  “Yeah, Lauren. Wonder why they didn’t send her. Because of what Abby Lawson and her grandmother, Glenda, told me … I’m not eager to volunteer a lot of information to the FBI at this point. I see no use in showing every card in a deck that might have been marked a long time ago.”

  “The days of J. Edgar Hoover, eh? Let’s hope that’s not the case.”

  As the men got closer to Jupiter, O’Brien stood. “Good morning.”

  The one in the sports coat said, “Sean O’Brien.”

  “That’s me.”

  The one in the blue jeans said, “Recognized your face from TV. You mind coming over here so we can talk?”

  “You mind telling me who you are?”

  The man in the sports coat took off his sunglasses and stared as if he needed to see O’Brien with his naked eyes. He stepped close to Gibraltar. The morning light wedged in his black eyes. Square jaw shaved so close his skin was still red from his
razor. “I’m Special Agent Steve Butler. And this is Special Agent Mike Gates.” Gates was in his mid-sixties, thinning grey hair combed straight back, eyes cool and detached. O’Brien thought he resembled the actor Anthony Hopkins.

  O’Brien said, “Sure, I can come up there on the dock, but it might be more comfortable if you fellows joined us down here for coffee. This is Dave Collins. The kid hosing off my boat, right over there, is Jason Canfield. The lady sitting in her deck chair on that nice trawler right behind you is Mrs. Pittman. Sweet lady. Has ears like an elephant and the personality of Henny-Penny, you know, the sky’s falling.”

  The men looked around them to the marina community awaking, people moving, watching. They walked down the side dock and stepped onto Gibraltar’s cockpit.

  “Coffee?” Dave asked.

  “No thanks,” they said in unison.

  O’Brien said, “I imagine you might want to chat with Jason. He’s my deckhand. I’ll call Nick. He’s in the boat on the other side of Dave’s boat. He was with us when we found it. That way you can ask whatever you want, get it all out of the way at once.”

  “We’ll decide who we question and when we question them,” said Special Agent Gates, his voice chilly, just above a whisper.

  “Let’s not get off on the wrong foot,” Dave said. “Please, sit down. The deck chairs are pretty comfortable. Or if you want, we can go inside.”

  “This is fine,” said agent Butler. He and Gates sat. Agent Butler began the questioning, “Tell us how you found the German submarine.”

  “Okay,” O’Brien said. “It started when I decided I’d get into the charter fishing business.” O’Brien told them the story as they scribbled notes, nodded and broke in with a question from time to time. When he finished, O’Brien asked, “Anything else?”

  “What did you bring up from the sub?” asked Gates.

  “Nothing.”

  “Did your dive partner, Nick Cronus, bring up anything?”

  “No.”

  “Would you submit to a polygraph?” asked Butler.

  “Yes.”

  “Could you find the sub again?” Gates asked.

  “Maybe.”

  Agent Butler raised his left eyebrow. “What do you mean by maybe? Aren’t the coordinates in your GPS?”

  “No, they’re not. We were at anchor, fishing. Catching nothing. I didn’t see a need to mark numbers. When we caught the sub, there was so much excitement, we forgot.”

  “And your men will concur with that?” Gates asked.

  “Yes.”

  Gates stared over the marina water, the reflection off the bay bouncing in his olive green eyes. For a moment, O’Brien saw a detached glimpse of absolute power. He knew he was looking at a man used to getting his way. Gates moved only his eyes to O’Brien. He didn’t blink.

  “Mr. O’Brien, we know of your background with Miami-Dade homicide. Some of our Miami agents speak highly of you and your investigative talents. But let me get one thing very straight, and put you on notice, too. If enriched uranium is, in fact, on that sub, then this is a very serious investigation. We won’t need, nor ask for your help in conducting any portion of it. The FBI has the manpower to nip this quickly, and we’re not looking for any soldiers to help or hinder us. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Clear as a bell,” O’Brien said with a smile.

  Dave said, “There is nothing territorial here. I’m retired CIA. I’m sure the agency will be in the thick of things, too. Because Sean and I understand your challenges, if there is anything that we can do or add to your investigation, please let us know.”

  “Do you know if anyone from the agency is here yet?” asked Butler.

  “No, not in an official capacity.”

  Agent Gates looked over at Jason washing down Jupiter and said, “It would have been more appropriate if you and your crew had come to us before all this hit the media.”

  “If you’re implying that Jason screwed up by having too much to drink and letting his girlfriend get it out of him, you’re right. But that’s happened, and there’s nothing we can do about it. I assure you, he feels awful.”

  “The unfortunate part is, with the Internet, this kind of stuff gets around the world in a matter of a few clicks,” Gates said. “What we know, the bad guys know. I’d hate to see one of them question that kid. If you did find weapons-grade uranium out there, the salvagers you’ll see can make sharks look like guppies.”

  Dave said, “We’re aware of the gravity.”

  “Are you?” asked Gates, standing. “O’Brien, you need to figure out where you were when you hooked that U-boat, and then take us out there.”

  “Could take a long time. Atlantic’s a big ocean,” O’Brien said.

  “Mike, you want to question the kid?” asked Agent Butler. “I’ll walk over and get to know Mr. Cronus.”

  O’Brien said, “Knock loudly on Nick’s door. He’s a sound sleeper.”

  ***

  THE FIRST REPORTER arrived at 10:00 a.m. It was an online newspaper reporter, bearded, plaid shirt, sleeves pushed up above his elbows, in tow with a pudgy photographer. The reporter stepped aboard Jupiter’s deck and knocked on the salon door. The photographer stayed dockside, both hands on his camera, ready.

  A TV news crew, reporter, and camera operator were coming down the dock, followed by a freelancer from the Associated Press.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  From inside Gibraltar, Dave Collins watched the media converge around Jupiter. He looked at Sean, Nick and Jason. “Gentlemen, the only way to combat the damage done is to do what politicians and pundits would do in these circumstances.”

  “And what would that be?” asked O’Brien.

  Dave sipped black coffee, grinned, peered out an opening in the curtains on the starboard window and said, “Spin it.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Nick

  “What I mean is survival.”

  “So what do we do now? Those FBI agents haven’t been long gone and now we got the news people coming around like gnats.”

  “We hold a news conference,” Dave said.

  “Where?” Jason asked.

  “Right here on the dock. We’re well represented by our esteemed fourth estate. They’re crawling out there, sniffing. It may be our only chance to shake this thing off your backs like little Max would shake water off her back. You three have had your faces plastered on international television, blogs and social media sites around the planet, courtesy of Susan Schulman. So you go out there, stand next to Jupiter and take their questions. What it’ll give you is an opportunity to distance yourselves with what could be a worldwide powder keg, so to speak.”

  “What do we say?” Jason asked.

  “You don’t say anything until asked. Then, it’s best to let Sean answer the questions. He is, after all, the captain of the vessel that locked horns with a submarine.”

  “The facts are,” O’Brien began, “we have no clue where the sub is. We didn’t get a GPS reading. We were using our fish-finder looking for rocks and other places where fish could hide, and the next thing you know, we hooked a German U-boat.”

  “What if they ask us about the skeletons?” Nick asked.

  Dave said, “Be truthful. Human remains are part of shipwrecks.”

  “But the HEU isn’t,” O’Brien said. “That’s where the questions will be directed.”

  “Probably,” Dave nodded. “However, all you saw were two canisters. Snapped a picture, everything else was twisted remains of a U-boat.”

  “What about those jet parts and some kind of rocket?” Jason asked.

  “What about them? You don’t know for sure what they are, so there’s nothing to say,” Dave said, sitting at his salon desk. “Remember, you guys are just fishermen stumbling across something. You’re not salvaging divers or treasure hunters. You’re just a bunch of average Joes excited about what you found, but ready to return to your livelihood, fishing, which is suffering.”

  “You comin’ out there wi
th us?” Nick asked.

  “It wouldn’t be prudent. Add to more confusion and personal jeopardy.”

  Nick shrugged. “I got nine lives. You have to when you dive for sponges.”

  “Come on Max,” O’Brien said. “You run interference as we meet the media.”

  ***

  “HOW MANY BODIES DID you see?” asked a TV news reporter.

  “Looked to be half a dozen or so,” O’Brien said.

  They stood on the dock next to Jupiter and fielded questions. The journalists now numbered seventeen. Fox News, CNN, ABC, NBC, BBC, Washington Post, New York Times, USA Today, A.P., local TV reporters and freelancers. Nine satellite news trucks beamed the interviews live to television and news websites. “Did you bring up the cylinders marked U-235?” asked an A.P. reporter.

  “No,” O’Brien said.

  “Can you find the sub again with GPS readings?” asked a Fox reporter.

  “Didn’t get them, it was all a little overwhelming.”

  To Jason, a reporter asked, “How did your girlfriend get pictures from inside the U-boat on her Facebook page?”

  Jason glanced at O’Brien for a second. “Umm, she sorta downloaded it off my camera-phone to her computer and posted them.”

  “Weren’t you quoted as saying you thought you could go back out there and find the U-boat?” asked a local TV reporter.

  “Umm, I may have said that … I was kinda bragging in front of my girlfriend … but I really couldn’t … you know … I wasn’t operating the boat. I’m not exactly sure where we were when the anchor got caught.”

  “Mr. Cronus, we understand you were the first to discover the U-boat,” said a CNN reporter. “How many cylinders of U-235 did you see?”

  “Same as what Sean saw, two. No more, no less.”

  The New York Times’ reporter asked, “Why did you all tell the Coast Guard you didn’t find a U-boat when, in fact, you’d just come from diving around one?”