by Cat Knight
But that was then.
She slipped on-board. The 50-foot boat was perfect for their trips along the coast of Europe or around England. She knew the boat had twin engines of some sort and enough range to take them almost anywhere they wanted to go. They had even taken it to Greece once. What a sun-filled vacation that had been.
She looked around for her husband calling out “Ahoy matey” her usual greeting. Even though she was certain he hadn’t yet arrived, she wanted to make sure. She had come early for a purpose, and she hurried up the steps to the bridge while she was still alone.
On the bridge, she looked at the controls, the screens, the devices. She had never learned how to operate them, but that didn’t matter. What mattered was what she had to do. She felt around the consoles, searching for a suitable nook. She discovered a small door that she opened. Inside was…nothing but cables and wires. It was one of those cubby holes that clever people added to hide unsightly wiring yet allow access.
As she slid the small recorder into the cubbyhole, she made sure to leave the door open. The recorder was voice activated, so it would pick up what was said, and she was pretty sure that would be enough. With a smile, she retreated down the ladder and into the rooms below. She smiled. At least, one part of her plan was working.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Lord Grey looked to the north where the squall line threatened with ugly darkness. According to the weather reports and his radar, the storm wasn’t anything to worry about. A few minutes of rain and wind and being tossed about, that was about it. He wasn’t worried. The Grey Lady had braved rougher weather than this. In a way, he was happy to have the storm. It would keep his mind off Monica, off the threat she had intimated before he left. According to Monica, he had to make a choice, a choice he didn’t care to make.
He wanted the safety of Lady Grey and the heat of Monica. Why couldn’t he have both?
“Here you are.”
He turned as Lady Grey handed him a flute of champagne.
“To our anniversary,” she said with a smile.
“Yes, cheers.”
He sipped the champagne and noticed that she was wearing the new earrings that he had purchased from Rodney. He had to admit that they did look fetching.
She nodded at the squall line. “That doesn’t look inviting.”
“Nothing we haven’t weathered before. We’ll not have a problem.”
“Good because I have something to show you.”
As he watched, she produced a picture, a picture that he couldn’t deny. There he was — with Monica. How had that happened? He hadn’t noticed any photographers around. Damn cell phones.
“Who is she?” Lady Grey asked.
“Would you rather I lied?” he asked.
“Please, we must not lose respect for one another. We’re not children.”
“In that case, I will admit to a certain dalliance with her.”
“I see. What is her name?”
“Is this necessary?”
“Her name.”
“Her name is Monica, and as you must know, she is considerably younger. I won’t bother with excuses or tommyrot. I find myself very drawn to her.”
“In a sexual and emotional manner?”
“Exactly. It’s not purely a body thing.”
He watched her lean away, her champagne rocking gently in her glass. He could tell this was not going well.
“That is unfortunate,” Lady Grey said. “I was hoping for a one-off sort of thing.”
“Are you thinking divorce?”
“I’m afraid there is no way around it.”
The boat rocked as the storm closed. He glanced at his instruments. “This isn’t exactly the time and place for this discussion.”
“It’s precisely the right time. Do you intend to do the right thing by me, or are you going to weasel out of this like the cheating cad you are?”
“Let’s not act like the rabble, dear. If you had been something warmer than an iceberg, we might not be facing this issue.”
“There is absolutely nothing wrong with my libido. It’s your mid-life crisis. Suddenly, you need something with a shorter skirt.”
“Let’s not quarrel.”
“Oh, let’s. How long have you been cheating on me?”
“Must we?”
“Is she the first?”
The boat rocked more severely. Lord Grey watched Lady Grey grab at a handle.
“If you must know, yes, she’s the first. And it hasn’t been that long, less than a year.”
“You must feel proud, fooling me for almost a year.”
“Hardly proud. I had hoped for a rather nice anniversary, but I suppose that’s out of the question.”
“You think I could possibly sleep with you after what you’ve done?”
“Come now, I wasn’t your first.”
“True, but you are the last.”
“Don’t be a bitch.”
“Bastard!”
He felt the champagne hit his face, and his reaction was immediate. The backhand caught her on the cheek, and, combined with the roll of the boat, sent her tumbling down the ladder. She hit the deck with a THUD.
“Blast!” he growled and throttled back the engines. He lashed the wheel in place and hurried down the ladder.
He needn’t have. He could tell by the way her head was turned that something awful had happened. Nevertheless, he knelt and felt for a pulse, a pulse he didn’t find. Staring at her, he felt the first drops of rain and the first pangs of panic.
He knew what should be done. He should turn around, run to port, and report what had happened. It wouldn’t look good, especially the part about him striking her, but it was the right thing to do. Of course, when they learned that he was cheating, the authorities might take a dimmer look at his explanation. Wasn’t it convenient that she just happened to tumble down the ladder and thus free him? Even if the Bobbies did believe him, the tabloids wouldn’t. He’d be mocked and vilified for the coming decade. No doubt, he would have to give up his seat also.
The rain lashed him, and the boat rocked, and the idea grew in his head.
He didn’t have to take the body back to port. He was in the middle of a squall, and while not calamitous, it did reek of danger. What if, what if he was fighting the wheel, and when he looked aft, he found her gone? In the wind and rain, he hadn’t heard her go over, and despite his circling, he never spotted her. Gone to the briny deep.
He stared at her, and he knew he had to make a quick decision. The squall would hide him for only a few minutes. So, he decided.
The spare anchor was in below, and he lugged it to the deck the best he could. A bit of rope and some secure knots, and she was ready for jettisoning. He dragged anchor and body to the gunwale and panted. Moment of destiny. Did he dare? She was already dead. What did he have to lose? He draped her body over the side as the rain soaked him. Then, the last thing he did was remove the diamond earrings. She wouldn’t need them where she was going.
“Sorry, my dear, but it’s over the side with you. Can’t leave a body for the Bobbies.” He heaved the anchor over, and it snatched the body off the railing. Anchor and body disappeared into the sea. “May you rest in peace… bitch.”
Panting, cold and wet, Lord Grey looked for a moment, half expecting her to bob to the surface and hector him, tell him he was going to rot in hell… no doubt. When she didn’t surface, he pushed off and staggered up the ladder to the bridge. He unlashed the wheel and throttled up. He wanted to be miles away before he called the coastguard.
As he steered, he felt a sudden pang of guilt. At the same time, he felt something akin to exhilaration. And that was awful.
Chapter Three
29th May 2018
Calm Stay Marina
London
United Kingdom
Darcy ran her sealing pen along the edges of the decal. The letters that spelled out Champagne Taste gleamed in silver grey catching flickers of sunlight. Well pleased with herself for he
r excellent skill in attaching the new name to her new boat, she hummed as she prepared herself for the next chores. These would be rewarding too, of course, but truth be told, cleaning wasn’t her favourite.
Darcy was no fan of cleaning supplies. In fact, she had learned to loathe mopping and swishing and wiping and especially dusting. What could come of stirring up a bunch of dirt? It wasn’t that the dust disappeared. All dusting managed to do was move the dirt around. Dust a table, and the window sill filled up.
Dust a bureau and write your name in the dust on the mantle. At least, mopping transferred the dirt from the floor to the water. That was progress. That was something.
As she swabbed the deck of her new boat, she was thankful that she wasn’t dusting, but she was disappointed by the amount of grime she was removing from the deck.
She knew the boat hadn’t been out to sea in some time, but she had expected some regular maintenance. In fact, the one time she had examined the boat, she hadn’t noticed such dirt. Her bucket was dark with what she removed, and she wasn’t sure she had reached the actual deck yet.
“Ahoy, matey.”
Darcy looked up. No one stood on the dock. She looked for a passing boat, but there wasn’t a boat either. Yet, she had heard a voice, a woman’s voice. She looked all round, but there wasn’t any woman to see. For a moment, she wondered if she was hearing something that wasn’t there.
No, that couldn’t be. The wind had carried a hailing from some other part of the marina. Nothing more, nothing less. She went back to work.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
An hour later, Darcy was satisfied with the deck. In fact, the original teak shone in the warm sun. Classic boats were blessed with classic details. Sweating, she emptied the bucket overboard and looked at the second item on her to-do list - a repair job. There was a nail head sticking out from the panelling in the head.
She wanted to call it a loo, but on a ship, it was a head, and she wasn’t sure why. And it didn’t matter. The panelling needed a bit of repair, and she was just the girl for it.
“Ahoy, matey.”
She looked around a second time, and once again, she saw no one. Then, the obvious truth struck her. Someone had installed the greeting instead of a bell. When someone stepped on-board, the woman’s voice alerted whoever was already on the boat, like a doorbell.
She smiled. Perhaps, she would get one for her boat. Better than Westminster chimes, wasn’t it? She grabbed a hammer from her tool kit and slipped below deck.
She was happy that the boat had a fully functional head, complete with a tiny shower. She didn’t know how any large person could use the shower, and she was pretty sure not many would. But everything on the boat had to be shipshape.
The Champagne Taste. That was what Darcy had decided to call her boat. She had already removed the remaining fragments of lettering from the previous owner’s name.
To keep the name “Eleanor” just didn’t suit Darcy. If she were to name it after anyone it would be herself of-course, but she didn’t want personal identity, she wanted a statement for her boat, something that would stand out to the honeymooner maker market she was aiming for. She slipped into the head, hammer in hand. The nail pop was toward the top. She spread her fingers on either side of the small nail and raised the hammer. Focusing on the head, Darcy let the hammer fly.
She missed.
ARRGH! Bloody hell!
Her smashed finger blazed with pain as the boat rolled. Darcy danced around in circles, whimpering, and shaking her whole hand, trying to ease the pain. For a moment, she couldn’t see as stars filled her vision. How the HELL… did she do that?
As the lights in her eyes faded, she pulled up her finger for examination. It had already begun to swell, and the nail showed an odd shade of blue and red. She needed ice, but she didn’t have ice. For a moment, she considered dipping her hand in the cool water, but putting her hand into the fetid water that sloshed against the boats in dock didn’t seem like a smart thing to do.
Instead, she sat and held her finger and waited for the pain to subside. Fixer-uppers were the bane of most boat owners. Something always needed fixing.
That the ocean had conspired with the boat didn’t seem right, but it was the price she paid for being off the grid, out on her own.
She sucked her finger in an effort to ease the pain. Why did sucking help? Not that she really cared. She took her finger out of her mouth and shook it. Why that worked was another conundrum. She shook until the pain subsided to a dull throb. Then, she looked at the errant nail. It still stuck out, and she still needed to fix it.
Standing, her knees wobbled from the waves and the shock of her damaged finger.
She steadied herself despite the pain.
Placing her fingers on either side of the nail she raised the hammer and started to swing.
The boat shifted for a second time. But she was prepared and stopped in mid-air. The hammer wouldn’t smash her finger again.
“What the bloody hell,” Darcy said out loud as the boat rolled beneath her.
Boats floated, and water moved, and when the water moved, the boat moved. But why did the water move so much when she tried to hammer a nail? The simple answer was that the boat didn’t move exactly when she raised a hammer. No, the boat moved all the time. She just wasn’t aware of the movement when she wasn’t hammering because her fingers weren’t in danger when she wasn’t hammering. When her fingers were in jeopardy, well, of course, she noticed.
Darcy took a deep breath and placed her fingers a little wider than before.
Ignoring the throb, holding the panel in place, she raised the hammer, waiting for the boat to lurch. It didn’t. She half swung, and the boat didn’t move an inch. Feeling stupid about trying to fake out a boat, she swung hard.
Bulls eye!
The nail sank into the panelling, and Darcy smiled despite the pain in her finger. Task number two was completed, and with only a modicum of pain. Was that blood underneath her nail? She made a face. How stupid would her nail look now? Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Task three on her list was the helm. Before she could go to sea, she had to make sure everything worked.
That included the engines, the compass, the GPS, and the radios. All her instruments had to pass muster. It was that simple. The ocean was a huge and lonesome place. Darcy didn’t want to be stranded.
She climbed the ladder to the bridge and looked around. This was hers, all hers, and while the boat needed some maintenance, it looked to be in fair shape. That was good since she had paid less than what the boat would normally be worth. A good deal wasn’t a good deal if she needed to make multiple repairs. Besides, she didn’t have the money for repairs. If she couldn’t put the boat to work, she was facing a money pit, and she didn’t have money to burn.
The engines started without a hitch. Darcy smiled. The other instruments powered up. She breathed out in a happy sigh. Things were working. She knew she had to examine the wires and cables inside the helm. What was she looking for?
Anything that looked corroded or worn, any bare wires. A short was the last thing she wanted.
She sank to her knees by the access door to the helm. Grabbing a flashlight, she opened the small door. She shone the light into the helm and reached inside. The boat shifted as it had when she was hammering, and the back of her hand slid across the entrance, skinning it across the bones.
“Bloody hell,” she said as she removed her hand. Blood filled the small grooves in her skin. She shook her hand in an effort to kill the pain. Was she getting clumsy or what? She reminded herself that she had intended to wear gloves—intended.
Why did people always remember safety after they had been injured?
She shone the light into the space and spotted nothing that needed work. She would examine the space digitally at some later date. Closing the access door, she looked at her list. What was task four?
Task four was checking the screws that held the railings in place. It was a menial job, but she
needed to complete it. Salt air devastated boat fittings and seals. People who didn’t live by the sea had no idea how corrosive salt air could be. Nothing seemed to last. And replacing all the metal on the boat was another cost. A few screws or fittings was all she could afford.
“Ahoy, matey.”
The greeting was getting annoying. Darcy knew that in time, she could come to loathe the cheery voice. When she found the proper boat, she would ask the skipper to dial down the volume. There was no reason to alert the entire marina every time he had a visitor.
Grabbing her screwdriver, Darcy started at the rear of the boat. She tightened every screw as she moved along the port side. It was grunt work, but grunt work had to be done.
She had moved a few feet, before the screwdriver slipped, and she busted her knuckles on the railing. Damn. She was getting clumsy. How many times had she tightened screws without drawing blood or inflicting bruises? She kissed her knuckles in an effort to ease the pain. And why had the screwdriver slipped in the first place? She glanced at her smashed finger and her scraped hand and now her bruised knuckles and wondered how she could have such bad luck.
She also wondered if she should quit for the day and tend to her aches and pains.
No, she couldn’t stop. She had other jobs to complete before she would be ready to take the boat on a charter. Concentrating, she moved to the next set of screws.
She reminded herself to be careful. What passenger wanted a captain with bandages all over her hands? No passenger.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
After the railings, Darcy needed to go up to the bridge. Climbing the ladder with only one hand was a pain, but it was doable—until the boat rolled to one side. Her feet missed the rung, and for a moment, she hung onto the ladder. But only for a moment. She had to let go, and when she did, she crashed to the deck. Her foot landed awkwardly, and her knee twisted painfully. In a moment, she was flat on her back, staring at the sky, and wondering which hurt worse, her knee or her finger.
