by Kathi Daley
“Hey, Ryder. What’s up? Wanna hit?” he offered him his pipe.
“No, thanks. I’m looking for Sam. Have you seen him?”
Ernie seemed to be struggling to focus. He looked like he was totally smashed. “Yeah. This afternoon. The guys and I went waterskiing. We stopped to party on Horseshoe Island, and Sam was there. Not on the island, but in a boat.”
“Boat?” I asked.
“Looked like Carson’s boat. I’m not sure why Sam was in Carson’s boat since it looked like he might have been there on official police business. He had on his uniform, and the boat he was in was tied up to another boat. A fishing boat. I remember thinking the guys in the fishing boat might have been poaching since that whole area is a marine preserve.”
“Did you speak to him?” Ryder asked.
“No. I waved, but then one of the guys from the fishing boat joined Sam on his boat, and then both boats took off. Didn’t see them again after that.”
“Can you describe the fishing boat?”
He paused.
To be honest, he was so baked I figured any description he gave would be questionable, but questionable was better than nothing.
“It was white with a blue stripe, but to be honest, I wasn’t really paying all that much attention to it.”
“Outboard?”
He paused and then nodded. “Seems like. Cuddy cabin and a wench. Seemed to be outfitted for professional use.”
“Do you remember anything about the men he was talking to?”
He slowly shook his head. “The guy who climbed onto his boat was an old dude. Brown skin and hair. Didn’t really notice the others.”
“How many men did you see?” Sam asked.
Ernie shrugged. “Three or four, I guess. Look, man, I’m sorry I can’t be more specific, but I didn’t know anyone was going to ask me about it, so I didn’t pay all that much attention.”
“Yeah, I get it.” Ryder took Ernie’s wallet out of his pocket and handed it to him. “I found this on the beach at Horseshoe Island.”
“Dude. I didn’t even know I lost it. I guess it must have fallen out of the pocket of my backpack when I pulled out my bottle of tequila.”
“If you think of anything else, call me. I’ll text you my number.”
Ernie slipped his wallet into his pocket and then took a hit on his pipe. “Mermaid,” he said. “The cabin of the boat had a mermaid on the side. Her tail was blue like the stripe.”
Figuring we’d gotten about as much out of Ernie as we were likely to, we headed back to Ryder’s truck.
“Now what?” I asked.
“I think it might be time to call Buford. Based on what we’ve been able to dig up, it really is beginning to sound as if Sam might be in trouble.”
I called Quinn and filled her in while Ryder called Sam’s deputy. In retrospect, we probably should have called Buford sooner, but I think Ryder and I both thought that if we looked around a bit, we’d be able to track Sam down. Maybe the boat he’d borrowed had broken down or run out of fuel. Maybe he was following a clue and had lost track of time. Maybe there was something going on between Sam and Quinn that Ryder and I simply didn’t know about, and maybe he’d changed his mind about meeting her. There were explanations for Sam not meeting up with Quinn that didn’t involve a violent end, but the more we discovered, the more convinced we both were that a violent end might actually be the case.
Chapter 13
Buford asked Ryder and me to meet him at the Hidden Harbor sheriff’s office once we’d gotten ahold of him. Technically, today had been his day off since he would be working the next three days while Sam was off, but given the situation, he was happy to come in. We explained everything that was going on. The first thought he had was to find Sam’s phone and truck. Ryder mentioned that Ernie had told us that Sam had probably borrowed Carson’s boat, so Buford called him to confirm this fact. As it turned out, Carson was out of town but had been fine with Sam borrowing his boat, so he’d called down to the marina and asked the harbormaster to give Sam access to the boat. As for the key, Carson had told Sam where to find his extra key, which he’d hidden in his garage. Given the fact that we knew that in order for Sam to access Carson’s boat, he had to go to the marina on the south shore rather than the marina where both Ryder and Nick kept their boats, we all headed in that direction.
I called Quinn and filled her in as Ryder drove us to the south end of the island.
“I hate that I can’t be there,” she said.
“I know. And if I was the one stuck in San Francisco, I’d be frantic as well. But there really isn’t anything you can do. There isn’t anything any of us can do except continue to search.”
“I found someone with a private chopper who’s willing to bring me to the island. It will be expensive, and I’ll have to come back for Jessica’s car when this is all over, so I was waiting to hear from you before committing, but I can’t just sit here. Can you pick me up in that big meadow where they usually set up the carnival in a couple of hours? It might be less. I’ll have to call you with an exact time.”
“Why not just land at the airport?”
“The guy I found isn’t exactly on the up and up. Apparently, he’s had some problems with his license and isn’t allowed to land or take off at either the airport on this side or the airport on Shipwreck Island. But we worked that all out. So, will you pick me up?”
“Of course,” I answered. “But are you sure you want to fly over the ocean in a helicopter, piloted by a man who’s been banned from at least two airports?”
“I’m sure. I’m going to call him back now. I’ll call you with an ETA.”
“Okay. I’ll see you later.”
After I hung up, I told Ryder what Quinn had planned. He looked as unhappy about the whole thing as I was, but we both knew that once Quinn set her mind to something, there was no stopping her.
As predicted, Sam’s truck was at the marina on the south shore. And as expected, Sam and the boat he borrowed, were nowhere to be found.
“So, now what?” I asked.
“I’m going to have the phone company ping his phone, although I suspect it’s turned off or destroyed,” Buford said.
I suspected the same thing, especially given the fact that the phone didn’t even ring. It simply went straight to voicemail, but any tiny piece of information at this point would provide a lead, which at the moment, was something we were seriously short of. I kept thinking about what Ernie had said about someone joining Sam in his boat before both boats left Horseshoe Island. Assuming the man who joined Sam was one of the bad guys in this story, which would explain why Sam hadn’t so much as called anyone, the only conclusion I could come up with was that by this point, he was probably dead. That wasn’t an option I could really deal with.
A few minutes later, Buford received a text with an address on the north shore. “It looks like we found Sam’s phone.”
“Great,” Ryder said. “Hopefully, Sam is with it.”
At least the location of the phone wasn’t in the middle of the ocean, which I’d suspected might be the case less than a minute ago.
Buford picked up his phone to call the Sea Haven office with an update. After he connected, however, I noticed he did all the listening and none of the talking.
“Okay,” he eventually said. “I’m on it. Have them call me when they get here.”
He hung up and looked at Ryder and me. “I’m afraid dispatch received a shots fired call just before I called in to speak to them about Sam’s phone. Sea Haven is sending two deputies over to help, but at this moment, I’m the only one here, so I have to respond.”
“I understand,” Ryder said. “You go and do that, and Kelly and I will start heading to the north shore. We’ll call and let you know what we find when we get there.”
Buford looked reluctant to let us go, but I sensed he wanted to find Sam as much as we did. After making us both promise to simply check out the situation and not to engage should we find t
hat Sam had been compromised by the man Ernie saw him speed away from Horseshoe Island with, he finally agreed to our plan.
“For the first time, I realize how inadequate it is for Hidden Harbor to only have two officers assigned to this entire side of the island,” I said to Ryder as we sped north once again.
“Sam has been trying to talk the county into a third officer for the Hidden Harbor office for a year, but in their opinion, two is adequate, and it really hasn’t been a problem in the past. Sam and Buford trade-off to give each other downtime, and the Sea Haven office is always happy to send someone over if there is a need. The amount of time it takes to get from Sea Haven to Hidden Harbor, however, can be a problem during an emergency situation. I suspect after this, Sam will have some fuel to add to his argument.”
We were halfway to the north shore when I got a text from Quinn. “Darn,” I said. “I forgot about Quinn. We’re supposed to pick her up on the south shore in twenty minutes.”
“That’s not going to happen,” Ryder said. “Call Carrie. It’s late and she probably already went to bed, but call anyway. If we can get ahold of her, she can pick Quinn up.”
I did as Ryder suggested. He was correct in the fact that Carrie had already gone to bed, but once I explained the situation, she assured me that she was happy to get up and get dressed to meet Quinn. I then texted Quinn back and let her know about the change in plans.
“Do you think he’s okay?” I asked. “Sam, I mean. Is it even possible that he has simply disappeared from the face of the earth yet is perfectly fine?”
Ryder snaked his right hand out until it met my left hand across the seat. He interlaced his fingers with mine and gave them a squeeze. “I think at this point, we have to assume that it is totally possible he’s fine. It’s really the only option open to us at this point. If he’s not, we’ll deal with it, but for now, we’re heading north to rescue our friend who is waiting for us to do just that.”
“Yeah. You’re right. Sam’s a smart guy. I’m sure he’s managing whatever situation he’s gotten himself into.”
Ryder made the drive from the south shore to the north shore in record time. When we arrived at the address Buford had provided, we immediately noticed a private dock with Carter’s boat tied up to it. The house associated with the dock was dark, so Ryder and I slowly made our way to the boat. A quick look around inside provided us with two new clues. The first clue was the phone we found tucked between the cushions of the long seat along the back of the boat. When Ryder turned it on, he saw that a text had been typed out but not sent. The text was to Buford, and the message simply said Dragon Cove.
“Maybe he was trying to tell Buford where the men he was with were taking him,” I said.
“That’s as good a bet as any. Dragon Cove is on this end of the island, about five miles east of here. There’s a nice deepwater cove to anchor in, and an old boathouse that hasn’t been in use for decades. It’d be a good place to hide something.”
“Or someone,” I finished his thought.
Ryder texted Buford and let him know about the boat, the phone, and the unsent text. He also shared the second clue with him, a length of rope about three feet long that appeared to be soaked in blood. Hopefully, it wasn’t Sam’s blood, but at this point, it made sense to operate under the assumption that Sam was alive, yet injured when he was last in the boat.
Buford texted Ryder back and informed him that the shots fired call was an active situation. A man with a gun, who’d had too much to drink, had taken his girlfriend hostage in one of the vacation rentals on the island. The guys who’d been on their way over from Sea Haven were headed to his location to help with the situation, so at least for the time being, we were on our own.
“I’ll text Carrie and tell her where we’re headed,” I offered. “You know that once Quinn lands on the island, she is going to want to be part of this, and to be honest, we need her. She’s used to this sort of thing. She’ll keep a level head, and she’ll know what to do should we catch up with the men who have Sam.”
“Aren’t you the one who used to be FBI?”
“I was, but I never so much as left the building. Given what I learned about Quinn the night we snuck onto Montgomery Island, I know that she has the skill set that will come in handy in a situation like this. If Buford and the others are going to be delayed, we’re going to need her.”
When Ryder and I arrived at Dragon Cove, we found the blue and white fishing boat Ernie had seen anchored in the bay. There was a rubber dingy on the beach, which I assumed had brought the men associated with the shadows that could be seen through the slats of the old boathouse to the shore.
“So, what now?” I whispered.
Ryder continued down the road, pulling off the pavement only after we’d rounded a corner, putting us out of sight of both the boat and the beach. “I’m going to text Buford,” he said, “and let him know what we found. You text Quinn and tell her to have Carrie drive past the cove and pull off the road only after she sees my truck. We can’t risk being seen from either the boat or the shore. We’ll have to hide the vehicles and walk in on foot.”
Once we’d each sent our texts, Ryder opened the driver’s side door and slipped out of the truck.
“Aren’t we going to wait for the others?” I asked.
“You are. I’m going to see if I can get a look inside the boathouse.”
“You shouldn’t go alone,” I argued.
“Going alone really is the safest bet. Wait here for Quinn and Carrie. Keep an eye on your phone. I’ll text you once I make my way back to the cove to let you know what I find.”
I groaned in frustration when Ryder left, but I supposed it did make sense for him to go and me to wait for the others. Not that I was thrilled with waiting, but Ryder did make a good point when he said that there was a lesser chance of him being seen by anyone who might be watching the boathouse if there was only a single figure sneaking through the thankfully dark night.
My phone buzzed shortly after Ryder left. I answered.
“What’s going on?” Quinn demanded.
“The boat Ernie saw tied up to the boat Sam borrowed this afternoon is anchored in Dragon Cove. It looks like there are people in the old boathouse. We noticed light and shadows, so they must have flashlights or lanterns. We suspect that men may still be on the boat as well. We are proceeding with caution.”
“Did you see Sammy? Is he definitely there?” she demanded.
“We couldn’t make out anyone specifically. Like I said, all we saw were shadows. Ryder went to check out the situation. I’m waiting for the two of you at the truck. Like I said in my text, continue past the cove. Don’t even slow down. We don’t want to draw anyone’s attention. There’s a sharp turn where the road heads back toward the south about a quarter of a mile down the road after the cove. Pull off the road. You should see Ryder’s truck tucked into the trees just beyond the first little clearing.”
“Okay,” Quinn said. “We’re on our way. I’m driving, so we should be there in about ten minutes.”
She hung up, and I went back to waiting. I knew it was going to take Ryder a while to sneak through the wooded area toward the cove, approach the boathouse without being seen and peek inside, and then get back to where I was waiting, but it still seemed as if he’d been gone a long time. I opened my phone to compare the time of my text to Quinn before Ryder headed out with the current time and realized that very little time had passed after all.
Ryder still wasn’t back by the time Quinn and Carrie arrived. After I greeted my friends, I texted him, letting him know that Quinn and Carrie had arrived and that we were all interested in his progress. He texted back, letting me know that he was on his way back, and we should sit tight. Easier said than done.
“I’m not just going to sit here,” Quinn said after I read Ryder’s text to her.
“I think we have to. Ryder will be here in a few minutes. He can fill us in on the situation, and we can figure out what to do from t
here.”
I could see that Quinn was itching to do something, anything, but for now, she simply nodded and began pacing back and forth along the little ridge that separated the forested area from the road.
It only took a few minutes for Ryder to appear from the path that cut through the forested area.
“So, what’d you find?” Quinn demanded before he could even make it all the way back to the truck.
“Sam is in the boathouse. He’s tied up, and there’s blood on his shirt, but he looks okay otherwise. There are two men with him. Both are armed, although neither seemed overly alert. I was able to sneak up to the double doors on the seaside of the building and push one of the doors open enough to take a peek inside, and they didn’t seem to notice a thing.”
“If you were on the seaside of the building, you would have been visible from the boat anchored offshore,” I pointed out.
“That’s true, but I figured the men wouldn’t be watching the sea doors, whereas they would be watching the little door that opens onto the beach.”
“So, what’s the plan?” Quinn asked.
Ryder frowned. “I’m not sure. I called Buford and filled him in. He’s in the middle of a tense situation himself and promised to call me back. I say we wait and see what he says.”
“But Sam…” Quinn started to argue.
“Looked just fine. I didn’t sense that he was in any immediate danger. If they wanted him dead, he’d be dead. Chances are they simply want him occupied until they are able to do whatever they’re here on the island to do and make their getaway.”
“I wish I had my gun,” Quinn grumbled.
“You have a gun?” I asked, surprised by this fact, although I supposed knowing Quinn, I really shouldn’t be.
“Of course, I have a gun. Don’t you? You were in the FBI,” she reminded me.
“I was in the FBI, but, as I keep reminding everyone, I worked as an analyst and not an operative, so no, I don’t have a gun.”
“Based on what Ernie remembered, it sounded like there were four men in all,” Ryder pointed out. “I only saw two in the boathouse, which means the other two are still on the boat or they are on the island taking care of whatever business they’re in the area to take care of. No one is going to make a move until we hear from Buford; gun or no gun.”
