by Michael Howe
“Who will Davy Jones look like?”
“He’ll look like me, Captain.”
“Very well. The boatswain has pretty good judgment.”
“So far, so good, Captain. Except for the weather at the moment.”
“You mean nobody’s blown us up yet or taken hostages? Yes, and no drunks have picked fights or fallen overboard either.”
“Dave Ellison mentioned to me that he’s a little worried about that boyfriend of your favorite singer—he drinks too much and has more of a thing about authority than most of us do—and I’m a little worried about Gardner, one of the tour guides the sponsor sent us. He tends to be a little aggressive at times. Seems to have already pissed off some of the passengers.”
“We’ll keep an eye on the three of them.” Covington knew that Winters didn’t like Ellison any better than he did. There was something about him. Maybe it was his attitude. Maybe it was nothing. At any rate, they were stuck with him. The owners had sent him.
“Penny,” said Pete Evans quietly and carefully, “you certainly don’t have to go ashore tomorrow—or whenever these people finally get us there—if you don’t feel comfortable doing it.”
Penny finished mixing her drink at the little bar in their suite and turned to him, keeping a solid grip on the bar as she did. “But I want to go ashore, Peter. That’s why I came. You came for the photo ops—to be seen with tuned-in people doing tuned-in things. I came for some adventure, a vacation from the wasteland that’s the life of a congressman’s wife. And you’re the one who doesn’t like boats.”
“What about your attacks?”
“Every now and then I feel a little dizzy and maybe lose my balance. It’s nothing. This ship has more people ready to help me than that singer, Chrissie, has men ready to die for her.
“Peter, whatever you’re here for, I’m here to see the penguins and the seals and the whales and whatever else there is to see. And don’t worry, I won’t embarrass you. That’s really what you’re worried about, isn’t it? That I’ll make a fool of myself and of you in front of the witless TV people.”
Peter Evans took a long sip of his Scotch. “Fine! We’ll go ashore together.”
“Maybe I shouldn’t have come along. You could have brought Jackie along, just like Senator Bergstrom brings his PA on trips like this in place of his wife. She’s young and athletic. She’d fit right in.”
Peter Evans listened to his wife’s words and looked at her face and knew what he had suspected for some time—Penny did know about him and Jackie.
What’s that son of a bitch doing here? thought Marcello Cagayan as he spotted Hensen using a wrench to open the access hatch to a rarely entered void near one of the ship’s fuel tanks. Cagayan was on watch; he belonged there as he made his rounds of the engineering spaces. Hensen was off watch. He wasn’t supposed to be in this area until four in the morning. And he wasn’t supposed to be screwing around in that void. There was no reason to be opening it.
The briefest flicker of panic passed through him. The son of a bitch was screwing around only a few feet from where two charges—each a combination of C4 and thermite—had been placed in the fuel tank, positioned so that when they detonated flaming diesel fuel would pour into the bilges.
Cagayan stepped back behind a mass of vertical pipes and watched as Hensen opened the hatch and pulled out a bag. Any sound the Filipino’s movements might make, any sound of air moving into and out of his lungs, was lost in the ship’s almost primal beat—the rumble of the engines and the periodic groans of the hull as it pounded and twisted its way through the living waters. A tremendous tension—a clash of fear and anticipation—had been growing within him the past few hours, causing his muscles to tense. Now it came to a head.
It was drugs . . . Of course! realized Cagayan. The bag was filled with little bags. Hensen was sitting cross-legged on the deck and counting little bags. Hensen was dealing right aboard the ship. The crew? The passengers?
He knew Hensen. Everybody knew Hensen and nobody liked him. It was a miracle he hadn’t already been pushed overboard. He had no trouble believing the pig was the ship’s dealer.
The ship was rolling, groaning quietly, and the air in the space tasted dead.
Cagayan calmed himself. Hensen couldn’t possibly stumble on the charges. They were inside the tank. He was no threat. But he was a prick, one who had gone out of his way to make life miserable for Cagayan. He reached into his pocket and felt the cell phone. As he held the phone, he felt a wave of confidence, of power, run up his arm and into his heart. There was no reason he had to kill Hensen, just as there had been no reason the soldier had to kill his father. But he would kill Hensen, because he was now certain he could kill him.
Cagayan reached down to his tool belt and pulled out a short screwdriver. A Phillips head. He stepped out quietly from behind the pipes and in four quiet steps was behind the dealer.
Hensen turned with a look first of surprise and then of irritation. “Oh shit! It’s the little monkey,” he said with a sneer as he turned back to sorting through the bag. “Get lost!”
A jolt of white-hot anger shot through Cagayan, fusing with his new sense of power and strengthening it. “Fuck you, prick,” he stuttered as he threw one leg over the seated drug dealer. Hensen outweighed his attacker almost two to one, and much of the difference was muscle. He tried to stand, to throw Cagayan to one side, but was unable to unwind his legs and move quickly enough. Cagayan used one hand to shove Hensen’s head against his leg while he drove the screwdriver into the dealer’s temple. Hensen’s head jerked back, his eyes full of shock. His mouth opened but nothing came out. Without waiting to determine the result of his first move, Cagayan yanked out the screwdriver and jammed it back into Hensen’s ear, only to withdraw it yet again and drive it once more into the temple.
Without even checking to see if his victim was really dead or just unconscious, Cagayan dragged Hensen by his head—using one hand to contain the blood trickling out of the wounds—toward the hatch to the void. He stuffed the body and its collection of magical pills and powders back into its rust-coated crypt. Continuing to move quickly, he used the rag he always carried when on watch to wipe off the screwdriver and clean up what little blood remained on the deck, and then threw it into the void. It was but the work of seconds to secure the hatch again.
Panting slightly, his teeth bared, Marcello Cagayan looked around.
Victory, a newfound sense of power, surged through him, making him tingle all over, making him want to roar. It was an experience he’d never had before. He then looked at his clothes. Blood. Too much blood. His shirt was covered with Hensen’s blood. He couldn’t just march off to his quarters and change his clothes. He was on watch.
A terrible thought burst through his joy. Was it possible he’d just fucked up? Killing Hensen wasn’t part of Omar’s plan. The engineman represented no real threat, and now, by killing him, he’d put himself in a dangerous position. An impossible position, covered with blood.
The possibility both scared and embarrassed him. Maybe he was a tonto. Maybe there was no good reason to kill Hensen. He reached again for the cell phone and started to open it. No, now was not yet the time. His work was barely begun.
And there was a solution. He walked aft about twenty feet, stooped over and opened a round scuttle in the deck. Holding his flashlight in one hand, he climbed down the ladder into the bilges and, careful to keep his shoes out of the inch or two of water, flashed the light around him.
There they were! Two shoulder-high steel beams that had been crudely cut during the overhaul. Considering their location, nobody had bothered to smooth their cutting torch-jagged edges. Gritting his teeth, but without hesitation, he dragged his left arm over the sharp, jagged surface. The pain was sharp, but nothing in comparison with what he had suffered on countless occasions over the years. Blood flowed out all along his forearm. After wiping some on the beam and more on his clothes, Cagayan struggled up the ladder and aft to Main Con
trol, where he reported to the engineer of the watch.
“What happened to you?” the officer demanded the moment he caught sight of the engineman.
“I was checking the bilges, sir, just aft of frame twenty-three, and slipped and fell on the end of one of those beams that were cut off during the overhaul.” As he spoke, he held up his gouged arm.
“Did you secure that scuttle after you?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Very well. You go to sick bay and have that arm fixed. Then come back here so I can fill out a complete report. The company’s very strict about injury reports.”
“Yes, sir.”
9
En Route to Ushuaia
Mike Chambers took a long sip of now-cold coffee and looked at the clock on his desk. 0300. Damn! Despite the temperate weather outside, the office felt cold and dungeonlike, as offices often do very early in the morning, when the rest of the world is home in their own beds.
A year before, with his rotation to shore duty approaching, he’d promised Jill he’d be home at a reasonable time for dinner, and maybe a movie every now and then, for the next couple years. After almost twenty years of putting up with his extended absences when his various ships had been deployed, not to mention the equally irritating shorter absences when they’d been operating locally, she deserved better. And, frankly, he wanted to be with her. He’d also promised himself he’d be able to spend more time, much more time, with Kenny, his fifteen-year-old son. He didn’t kid himself that now was the time Kenny needed him the most. He’d probably needed him more a couple years ago, but there was still time for him to help the boy break some of the undesirable attitudes he’d already developed. At least he hoped so.
That was all then. Now he was sitting in his office in the middle of the night, drinking cold coffee and reasonably certain that he was going to send himself and his group off on a nine- or ten-thousand-mile trip before he even got home again.
The phone finally rang.
“Boss, this is Ray.”
“What’s up?” asked Mike, letting out a small sigh of relief. He hadn’t hesitated to send the pair to Rio, but he hadn’t been really comfortable with it. Neither was trained to troll for intelligence in foreign cities, and although Ray could probably make himself comfortable there, Ted—being 100 percent mainland American—might not.
“We made contact with Dani, the girl, and learned a thing or two, although nothing earth-shattering.”
“Shoot.”
“She’s seen and eavesdropped on the pair. It seems that Coccoli’s an arrogant little stud—just like the yard workers told us—and Rojas is more timid. She hasn’t seen either in a week or two, but before that both were talking as if they were in on some big deal that was going to make them rich. She assumed it was drugs.” As the marine spoke, Mike sensed something wrong. It was as if Ray was having to make an effort to speak.
“You okay, Ray?”
“Yes, sir. Winded and a little bruised but okay.”
When Ray paused, Mike happened to glance up to find Alex, who had been napping on one of the cots they maintained for long nights, standing at his door. He smiled and waved her to a chair and turned on the phone’s speaker.
“Possibly the most interesting tidbit was that both referred to someone named Omar in connection with this big deal of theirs.”
“Omar?”
“That’s it. Omar. Dani never saw him and never heard of him.”
“Ray, god damn it, there’s something you’re not telling me.”
“We had a problem, Captain.”
“What?”
“While we were talking to Dani, a couple guys came in. Said they were federal police and seemed to have the IDs to prove it, although now it’s obvious they weren’t. Before we could do anything, they slugged us with blackjacks, took our weapons and marched us out to a van. Then another crew opened fire on them and us with machine guns. Thanks to Ted we managed to slip away.”
“Casualties?”
“Ted’s got a hole in his arm and we both have unbelievable headaches. I’ve cleaned Ted’s arm and treated it with antibiotics from the medkit.”
“What about your heads?”
“We’ll be okay, someday. We’ve looked into each other’s eyes and they seem normal. And no double vision.”
“How romantic!
“You are two lucky sons of bitches,” continued Mike after a pause. “You sure it wasn’t a setup?”
“I think it was, sir. By the druggies. I’ve now learned not to go around asking questions that even hint at drugs in Rio—or in shipyards.”
“Listen up, Captain,” said Mike to the marine officer. “What you’ve come up with is just enough to confirm my desire to do some cruising in Aurora Australis. The taxpayers can afford it.”
“It might be worth it to go back and talk to some of the other bar patrons who knew Coccoli and Rojas. Maybe they can tell us something about this Omar.”
“Forget about it. It sounds to me like nobody’s going to be willing to talk to either of you two at this point. They’ll probably run like hell the minute they see you. We’ll see if Alex’s friends can follow through and come up with anything.”
“Aye, sir.”
“Are you sure Ted doesn’t need a doctor now?”
“He’s a SEAL, sir.”
Mike glanced at Alex and rolled his eyes.
“Assume we’re going to extract you in the next twelve hours or less. In the meantime, stay in your room. Are you still armed?”
“One Saturday night special Ted snatched from one of the thugs.”
“Don’t even go out for food until further notice. I’m going to clear this with Alan and I’ll be back to you in a few minutes. Don’t turn your phone off.”
“Aye, aye, sir.” He hung up.
“They’re okay, then?” asked Alex, a worried look on her face.
“At the moment. Please listen carefully to what I tell Alan. Most of it will probably be the truth.”
Mike then dialed Alan Parker’s secure home number.
“Parker.”
“Mike Chambers. Are you awake, Alan?”
“Yes.” He didn’t really sound it, but that didn’t matter to Mike.
“Ray and Ted have picked up a little extra intel in Rio on those two shipfitters. Our guys were also attacked. Set up by somebody. I plan to extract them ASAP. I also plan to take the team to Aurora.”
“All of it?”
“Everybody but Vincent, the new guy. I have to leave somebody to mind the shop.”
“And what will you do?”
“Search the ship. Try to spot something.”
“I thought you said there weren’t going to be any incidents.”
“Things happen.”
“How’re you going to get to the ship?”
“Extract Ray and Ted then fly to Ushuaia and helo out to her.”
“That’s a long flight for a helo.”
“It’s doable.”
“And the weather?”
“Miserable at the moment but wait an hour.”
“You going to use a cover or just let it all hang out?”
“We’re performing a random security checkup on the ship at the owner’s request. It’s a new service . . .”
“I never heard of it.”
“Nobody else has either. Yet.”
“It does make sense. Proactive. May even keep Homeland Security off our backs. Just as long as we don’t ruffle the passengers’ feathers.”
“Homeland Security?”
“They’re beginning to define the American homeland as the entire world. Okay. Dress warm, buddy.”
Mike hung up and looked at Alex. “You get all that?”
“A jet to Ushuaia, via Rio. A helo to Antarctica and earmuffs for all. I suppose you want me to explain our new service to the ship’s owners.”
“You’re always more convincing than I am.”
“You care whose jet?”
“Try your f
riends.”
“And the helo?”
“Try the civilian contractors first. I don’t want to spend time explaining what we’re doing to some Argentine admiral.”
“Weapons?”
“Glocks, automatic rifles and Tasers for everybody . . . a riot gun and a dozen flash-bangs.”
“I’m on it, Boss.”
An hour later Mike was back on the phone to Rio: “We’re scheduled to fly out of Tampa at zero four hundred in a CIA jet which should reach Jobim about eleven hundred. You wait at the hotel until it’s time to check out and take a cab. When you get to the airport, go to the general aviation section, to the Aviaos Sul facility.”
“Were both ready, Captain.”
“How’s Ted’s arm?”
“Still bleeding. Minimally.”
“Will he be any good to us?”
“He just killed a man armed with an automatic weapon, sir.”
“I’ll round up a corpsman and bring him or her along. Alex is arranging for Anglo-Swiss Re to inform Tecmar that you two seem to have gotten into the drug business a little deeper than you were prepared for so they pulled you out. They can deal with the federal police, I hope. Is there anything else anybody expects you to be doing while you’re there?”
“We were supposed to meet this morning with Mr. al Hussein, the owner’s representative. They say he’s the moving force there.”
“One hell of an engineer, from what I read. I’d love to sit down and have a beer with him sometime. Anglo-Swiss will have to include a special apology to him in their message. Anything else?”
“No, sir.”
“See you in a few hours, then.”
At shortly after eleven fifteen in the morning a twenty-passenger executive jet marked “Liberation Airways,” landed at the Antonio Carlos Jobim International Airport. After slowing and turning off the runway, it taxied promptly to the Aviaos Sul hangar, where it stopped, leaving both of its engines whooshing gently as they idled. Ray and Ted, who were standing next to the hangar, had sprinted out to the plane before the door even opened.
“Okay, you two,” shouted Mike as he lowered the ladder, “in the plane. I’ve got a doctor here. She’ll check you both over on the way to Ushuaia. After she’s looked at Ted, I’ll decide whether he goes on with us or goes back with the doctor. Now find some seats and secure your seat belts.”
