Steady As She Goes: A Jesse McDermitt Novel (Caribbean Adventure Series Book 21)

by Wayne Stinnett

“The crane’s movin’ again,” Matt said.

  As we watched, the crane began moving containers, stacking them haphazardly on top of the lumber. Finally, the steel plate came up and then two officers escorted the two women out of the hold, leading them aft. With the decks awash in bright lights, I could see it was Emma and Nancy. They were helped into one of the patrol boats, where one of the cops stayed with them.

  I punched the button for my quarters. “Bridge to Val.”

  “What’s going on?” she asked immediately.

  “Emma and Nancy are safe,” I said. “Let Jocko know.”

  “I will,” she said. “Thanks.”

  “And can you tell David to report to the bridge?”

  “Right away,” she replied.

  I looked back into the op center. Chip McAllister was the only one there. I went back and tapped him on the shoulder. He jumped, then removed his headset.

  “Captain McDermitt? Sorry, I’m working with one of the field ops and didn’t hear you.”

  “That’s okay, son. Finish up and then clear the op center.”

  “Clear the—”

  “David’s on his way up here and I need him to do something illegal.”

  Chip looked confused. “But just about everything we do is technically illegal, sir.”

  “This time, we’ll be doing something illegal to a friendly government.”

  “Oh…uh…just give me a second to finish up with DJ.”

  “Tell him I said hi.”

  I returned to the bridge to wait for David. Chip left a few minutes later. When David arrived, I nodded toward the empty op center and he followed me.

  “I need you to get into the Grenada Police Department’s network,” I said. “They’ll be bringing in several men soon, and I want to know everything there is to know about them.”

  He glanced forward, to where Gerald and Matt continued to monitor the situation on Canopus. “What’s going on?”

  “Remember the boat that attacked our launches, just after Tank died? It came from that ship out there. I think they’re part of the human trafficking operation we’ve been looking for.”

  “Do the authorities know that?”

  “No,” I replied. “And we don’t want them to know. At least not yet.”

  “Okay,” he said, moving toward his usual console on the port side. “Do you know where these men are being taken?”

  “Not for certain,” I replied. “One boat came from the Port Authority pier just across the inner harbor. The other came from up north somewhere.”

  “I’ll get started,” he said. “The main police station is near the Port Authority. That’s probably where they’ll take them.”

  I grabbed his elbow as he turned. “What I’m asking you to do, hack into a friendly government’s computer, is not just illegal, it could get the ship and crew expelled from the country. Permanently.”

  “I understand,” he said. “No tracks.”

  I returned to the bridge to watch the activity on Canopus. A third, larger boat was moving toward the ship and the first one with our crew aboard was about to leave.

  The ship’s phone rang on the bulkhead. I picked it up. “Research Vessel Ambrosia.”

  “Is dis de cap’n?” a man with an island accent asked.

  “Yes, this is Captain McDermitt.”

  “Dis is Inspector Whyte. Do you remember me?”

  The customs inspector?

  “Hello, Claude. Yes, what can I do for you?”

  “I am on my way out to a ship anchored in St. George’s Bay, Jesse. I am told you provided de tip about what was happening out dere.”

  “The two women being kidnapped are part of my crew,” I said.

  “I was told dat, as well,” Claude said. “I just wasn’t aware dat you knew who dey were.”

  “I wasn’t until I saw the police removing them from the ship.”

  “Ambrosia will still be here for a day or two?”

  “Yes,” I replied.

  “Den I will have de police bring your crew to your ship,” he said. “De officer I spoke wit said dey appear to be unhurt. I will come by in de morning to question dem.”

  “Thank you, Claude.”

  We ended the call and I looked toward Canopus again. The patrol boat with Emma and Nancy aboard was already headed our way.

  I pushed the button for the intercom to the equipment area below the cockpit. “Bridge to security.”

  “Stockwell,” came the quick reply.

  “The police are bringing Emma and Nancy straight here, Travis.”

  “Roger that,” he said. “We already closed the garage door. I’ll move our guests to the engine room.”

  “Keep the noise down,” I said with a grin. “They’ll be here in less than five minutes. I’ll come down when they’re gone.”

  I turned to Matt. “Head down to meet the police boat. I’ll join you in a minute.”

  He left the binos on the nav desk and exited the bridge. I picked them up and studied the ship for a moment, then turned to go down and join him. I paused by the hatch and looked back at David.

  “I’m in,” he said. “So far only preliminary dispatch reports on the event have been submitted.”

  I nodded and started to open the hatch but paused. “Just out of curiosity. Would it be possible for a report to be changed without anyone knowing it?”

  He looked at me questioningly. “An arrest report? Something like that?”

  “Yeah. Is it possible?”

  “I can change it or make it all disappear permanently from their files,” he stated. “And get out without anyone knowing. It would be like they’d never been there.”

  I nodded and left the bridge to join Matt. A couple of minutes later, the patrol boat came alongside and turned around, maneuvering stern toward the dock beside the work deck.

  We helped Emma and Nancy over the boat’s low gunwale and onto the work platform.

  “Are you all right?” I asked them both.

  “Yes,” Emma said. “It all happened so fast. Has Jocko been found?”

  “He’s safe aboard,” I said. “Probably on the mess deck.”

  “They beat him terribly,” Nancy added. “No telling what would have happened to us if the police hadn’t gotten there in time.”

  “Go find Jocko,” I said. “He could use a little good news.”

  When they left, one of the officers leaned against the gunwale. “I heard de tip about de attempted kidnapping came from you.”

  “Lucky I was on the flybridge, stargazing,” I lied.

  “Did you happen to see another boat leave de ship? Dere are davits for three lifeboats and only two are dere. Questioning de crew, we found dat de captain was not aboard.”

  “No,” I replied, knowing they’d never find the third boat. “I saw the boat leave the ship with three men aboard and a little while later, it returned with the same three men and two of my crew members. I didn’t know it was Emma and Nancy at the time but could easily tell they were being taken against their will. That’s why I called you guys.”

  “Tank you, Captain,” he said. “Inspector Whyte will be in touch tomorrow.”

  The driver put the small patrol boat into gear, and it idled away,

  “That’s not exactly ’ow it ’appened, Cap’n,” Matt said. “Wasson?”

  For a long time, I’d wondered why Jack Armstrong wanted me to command Ambrosia, and suddenly it became quite clear. Nils Hansen had been a great skipper. He knew the sea better than most and ran his ship in the traditional way. But he was a civilian and likely lacked tactical skills and battle instincts. Which was probably why Jack had insisted that his head of security be stationed aboard Ambrosia, rather than at the company’s headquarters in New York or the logistics command center in Bimini.

  “We’re about to commit a few crimes, Matt.”

  I sent Matt back up to the bridge, telling him I’d join him there as soon
as I checked on things with Stockwell. Rather than open the garage door again, where there was a watertight access hatch to the engine room, I went up to the salon and down the spiral stairs to the crew’s deck and then down to the engine room.

  One man lay prone on the deck, not moving. Woden sniffed at him a second then followed me.

  “Sorry, Captain, that one’s dead,” Duster said. “He came at me with a knife and left me no choice.”

  I didn’t care. These men had chosen their path in life. Few ever went that route who didn’t end up meeting a violent end. I’d been the instrument to that end a few times in the past and likely would be again.

  The other three men were seated on the floor, hands bound behind them. Each had busted lips or open cuts on their faces, with blood on their shirts.

  “Which one of you is Mauricio Gonzales?” I asked.

  “Fuck you!” the man on the left said.

  I kicked him in the groin and he rolled on his side, curling into a fetal position, moaning loudly.

  In my experience, the first to speak was never the one you sought. They spoke out of allegiance to the one you wanted. That left two.

  “The police have your ship,” I said to the remaining two men. “The women you took are back aboard my ship. So, I’ll ask one more time. Which one of you is the captain?”

  “He is,” the man in the middle said, nodding toward the other.

  “He’s lying!” the last man exclaimed. “He is captain!”

  I studied the two men carefully. Then, without warning, I pulled my Sig from under my shirt and pointed it at the man I’d kicked.

  I shot him in the head, and he stopped his whining.

  Putting the barrel against the last man’s head, I bent closer, looking into his eyes. “You are the captain of Canopus.”

  He nodded.

  “I would have gotten them to talk,” Travis said. “Eventually.”

  I turned toward Oswald. “Move the other three over by the garage access hatch.”

  Duster and Walt dragged the two dead men and Oswald forced the third man to follow.

  “Who do you work for?” I snarled at Gonzales.

  “I don’t know what you mean,” he replied in broken English.

  “You kidnap innocent people, mostly women and girls. Who do you take them to?”

  “I have never—”

  The back of Stockwell’s hand knocked the rest of the man’s words right out of his mouth.

  “Not cooperating means you’ll end up like those two men back there,” I said. “If you want to live to see dawn, you’ll tell me everything I want to know.”

  “Who are you people?” Mauricio asked with a gasp.

  Travis grabbed him by the shirt front and lifted him to his knees, bending to sneer in his face. “I’m your worst damned nightmare,” he growled menacingly. “Your thugs shot me the other day. I don’t like being shot.” Then, he nodded toward me. “And he’s the devil himself. He dispatched your men straight to hell for shooting me. You picked the wrong damned boat to mess with.”

  Gonzales looked from Travis to me, then back at him. “They will find me and kill me if I talk.”

  “Maybe they will,” I said. “At some point in the future. But I will kill you right here, right now, if you don’t talk. Then I’ll go to bed and sleep soundly.”

  He didn't say anything.

  “Woden, make him talk,” I ordered.

  The big dog lumbered toward the man, his lips pulled back in a menacing snarl, as a low rumble eliminated from deep in his chest. “Cartel de los Soles!”

  “Bleib stehen,” I ordered, and Woden stopped his advance.

  “Cartel of the Suns?” Travis asked.

  He nodded.

  Travis turned toward me. “That organization is run by top-level officials and high-ranking officers in Venezuela’s military.”

  I nodded, then bent down to Gonzales. “Where do you take them?”

  “To a man in Puerto Borburata,” he said.

  Once the dam is opened, most will continue talking.

  “What’s his name?” I demanded.

  “What does it matter?” Gonzales pleaded. “You cannot possibly take on Los Soles.”

  “Then telling me who you took your captives to shouldn’t make any difference,” I said. “What’s his name?”

  He was silent for a moment, then his shoulders slumped. “I only know him as Juan. He puts the cargo into vans and leaves the port.”

  Cargo? To this man, the people he kidnapped and sold into slavery were nothing but a commodity—cargo to be transported to market.

  Moving them by van didn’t make sense. Sure, there were a lot of nasty characters in South America—murder and rape are considered a pastime in some of the more lawless regions. But they just took what they wanted; they didn’t have to buy slaves. And many of the people reported captured had been grown men, which were far easier to force into labor locally.

  “Where does Juan take the captives?” I asked.

  “I do not know,” Gonzales replied, fear evident in his eyes.

  I brought the Sig up and pointed the barrel at his groin. “I can shoot you many times without killing you.”

  “I swear it!” he shouted. “There are rumors of a ghost ship—a ship that cannot be seen on the ocean. That is all I know.”

  “Are you sure that’s all you know?”

  He looked over at Travis, who was now leaning against the bulkhead, examining his fingernails.

  “Don’t look at me for help,” Travis said. “I warned you that he was the devil.”

  “Juan sometimes keeps a girl for himself,” Gonzales said. “He told me one time that the sultans in Damascus should not get all the fun.”

  “When was the last time you took people to Juan?”

  “On Monday,” he replied. “Nine days ago.”

  I looked over at Travis and he nodded aft. We went back to where Oswald and the others waited with the one remaining prisoner, who was now gagged.

  “I think he’s telling the truth,” Travis said. “He said it himself, he’s just a freight hauler. All we have to do is check ships bound for Syria that left Puerto Borburata nine days ago. It couldn’t have crossed the Atlantic and run the length of the Med in that time.”

  “What do we do with these?”

  He shrugged. “Leave that to me. I overheard you outside, talking to the policeman on the boat. You know they’re going to continue to search for the captain.”

  I grinned at him. “I’ve got an idea about that.”

  I went up to the op center. David glanced at me as I entered.

  “They’re being booked,” he said, pointing to the screen. “Half have already been processed.”

  I looked at several mug shots on his monitor, each with a name below. One was the surfer guy from the bar, a man named Brad Thomas.

  “Make it so that blond guy is the captain of Canopus. When a black man with a shaved head gets booked, make him the first mate.”

  “What if they check licensing?”

  “It wouldn’t be the first time someone without a license commanded a ship. Besides, who are they going to believe?” I pointed to Thomas’s picture. “That guy or their own report?”

  One week later

  Ambrosia lay against the dock at the Armstrong shipyard in Bimini. Most of the crew had been given a week off, but Heitor and Ricardo, plus a handful of others, had stayed aboard, including the rest of the Santiago family.

  I was planning to fly Island Hopper back to the Keys the following morning with Savannah and Alberto. But first, Jack wanted to see me.

  “He didn’t say what he wanted?” Savannah asked.

  “Just that he had something to show me over at the dry dock.”

  “Well, you’d better get moving,” she said. “You don’t keep a man like Jack Armstrong waiting. I’ll get everything packed and have Jocko take it over to the hangar.”

&nb
sp; As I walked down the gangway, Matt and Val were coming toward me on the dock.

  “I thought the two of you were going down to Freeport,” I said.

  “The bleddy mailboat won’t be ’ere until morn,” Matt replied.

  “So, we’re just going to hang out with Giselle and Ricardo,” Val added. “We could fly Bahamas Air, but we’re in no hurry.”

  “Any word yet on that container ship, Canadian Gold?” Matt asked.

  We’d pulled up shipping records and found that only one ship left Puerto Borburata bound for Syria during that whole week. It had made one stop, in Miami, where, overnight, cocaine busts on the streets were on the rise. We knew we’d found the right ship.

  “Canadian Gold was raided yesterday by UN forces,” I replied. “Just as it docked in Latakia, Syria. They had an underground facility there to unload some sort of container which was attached to the belly of the ship.”

  “Did they say how many people were in it?” Val asked.

  “Thirty-seven victims were rescued,” I replied. “Mostly from Guyana and Brazil, but there were also four American women. And there were also two bodies.”

  Matt shuddered. “I wonder ’ow many times she took ’em poor people across the ocean.”

  “Early interrogations revealed who Gonzales’s contact was,” I said. “A man named Juan Espinoza, a colonel in the Venezuelan Army. An American spec-ops team, flown in by none other than Bud Ferguson, raided Espinoza’s compound.”

  “Giss on!” Matt exclaimed. “Once a birdwatcher, always a birdwatcher. Ain’t that what I said?”

  “They found a young Guyanese girl in the basement of his house, barely alive,” I said. “Along with a mass grave behind the house. They’re still counting the bodies of the girls he took there to torture and kill.”

  “Sick pervert,” Val said. “There’s a special place in hell for men like him.”

  “I have to go meet Jack,” I said. “But I’ll see you again before we take off in the morning.”

  “Aight,” Matt said, and the two headed up the gangway.

  When I got to the dry dock, I could see that it was empty. Well, not entirely empty. Workers were busy in many places, moving things around. A couple of men were busy in the middle, welding two giant aluminum plates to a crossmember.