High Seas Drifter (Cruise Confidential 4)

by Brian David Bruns

  Thus, the call I made telling Bianca to not come aboard with me—my first dreaded ‘no’. We'd hardly spoken since. Yet we did see each other once. Making it happen had been a chore of the highest calibre. Wind Surf had been docked in Taormina. Bianca's ship had also been docked on the same, eastern shore of Sicily. The distance between the two cities was not so great from an American perspective—just over fifty kilometers—but Sicilian highways were not the stuff of the Eisenhower Interstate System. Unfortunately I had to request Cosmina's assistance to make it happen.

  "So you want me to book a hotel in Messina," Cosmina said with a wry smile.

  "Just transportation," I had said. This left Cosmina utterly confused.

  "Don't you want her back?"

  "Things are a little more complicated than that," I said. "We didn't really end it, per se."

  "So I'll get you a room."

  "I'm not going for a quick romp in the sack," I said. "We need to talk."

  "Talk," she repeated flatly. "About limestone? You talk afterwards!"

  When Surf passed by Messina that morning—at 8 o'clock sharp, I remember—Carnival Liberty was already easing into port. I wanted to run to the bridge and scream, 'Stop the ship!' I couldn't help it. Whenever Bianca was near, I completely lost my head. Fortunately, the taxi Cosmina procured got me there in record time. That was not entirely a good thing, though. He drove over 150 kilometers an hour the entire way, swinging in and out of traffic, invariably on the wrong side of the cliff-hugging so-called highway. I thought I was going to die. But to Messina I asked, and at Messina I was. The crew of Liberty was just beginning to tackle the mooring lines. They moved like snails. Apparently Italians take their sweet time on everything but driving. After waiting for an eternity, I had to wait even longer: the passengers disembarked first. The ship disgorged thousands upon thousands of leisurely, vacationing passengers.

  After nearly an hour—an hour that chewed deeply into the five we had available—Bianca finally crossed the gangway. As always, she exuded a sexy self-confidence. Just the sight of her made me tingle with expectation—it was ever chemical between us. She wore a body hugging purple outfit with a criminally short skirt. She was well aware that her legs were her best feature and flaunted them accordingly. As she descended the gangway, it was impossible not to ogle at those legs so radiantly exposed—nor was it possible to not ogle at the American flag panties equally revealed. I'd never wanted to salute the flag so much in my life. Maybe Cosmina had been right. Bianca threw herself into my arms and we hugged, hugged, and hugged some more.

  We walked the crowded, noisy streets of Messina for awhile, looking for a place to sit and talk. There were no restaurants, cafés, or any such recreational facilities anywhere. When I expressed frustration at this, she explained she had known that all along. Rather, she had been hoping for an open-topped tour bus so we could see the sights together.

  Eventually we found a pizzeria. Three metal tables sat crookedly upon an uneven sidewalk. Traffic buzzed and belched by. The time was short, the weather was hot, and the city was loud. We sat between a squabbling family from California and an incessant car alarm. Still, I had my four hours with her, for what they were worth. Not much, actually. She seemed more interested in Messina than me, which was more than a little annoying. This was a new side to her, an added complication to a relationship that I had already decided was too complicated. We hadn't seen each other in a couple weeks, but noisy, stinky Messina seemed to dominate our discussion.

  Now it was closer to six weeks. We had exchanged only a few emails in that time—on ships sending an email was quite an ordeal—but the most recent had been abrupt on a level that infuriated me:

  My vacation begins Feb. 4. Well?

  Another of her vexing 'not now, but come back to me' emails. Only this time, for the first time, she was downright rude about it. No doubt she sensed a change in tone on my end since that fateful phone call on Surf. That didn't excuse rudeness. I had been very angry. I didn't feel my efforts were being reciprocated or, for that matter, even appreciated. Yet through it all, I wallowed in wondering if I betrayed her. In my gut I knew she wouldn't be happy on Surf, but it just wasn't my call to make. I had to give her the chance to prove me right or wrong. A chance—a last chance—to put it all on the table: which is more important, money or me?

  And so I stepped on the train, bound for Cannes.

  The best way to experience the Cote D'Azur, or French Riviera, is by train. The trip may only be an hour or so, but the ride sears itself forever into your skull through sheer beauty. The experience surpasses all of man's paltry purview, for from the rails one views the coast from on high, as if one of the gods themselves admiring upon the fruits of man. The train snakes atop cliffs tufted with palms and sprouting billion dollar villas; the playground of royalty past and super-rich today. Beyond glitters the sea, painfully brilliant and impossibly blue. But as the train wends its way along, you spy new wonders with each curve: snuggled into natural harbors, protected by cliffs dripping with stately excess, hide quaint villages of intense character: Cap d'Ail, Beaulieu-sur-Mer, Villefranche-sur-Mer. But these are not for you, mere mortal. You are not, and cannot be, worthy. For you is to but gape, to wonder, to dream.

  Alas, the experience had to end. But did it? For I alit upon the platform of Cannes. Though crushed by the humidity and heat, I was nevertheless exhilarated. The walk to the pier, outside of which incongruously loomed Carnival Liberty, was a long one. I reveled in every step. I passed the famed Grand Théâtre Lumière, where the Cannes film festival debuts its feature films. It was so beautiful it was a wonder anybody wanted to go inside at all. Presumably it was just as impressive inside, though I couldn't fathom how. But, sappy as it sounded, I was more keen to see Bianca. Though no doubt marred by fatigued eyes and bent back after months slaving in the restaurants, her beauty was always my greatest joy to behold. I simply couldn't deny it.

  When I finally got to the long, stretching pier, I was exhausted. Though wondrous, the train ride had been quite stressful. Though Cannes was not far from Monte Carlo, it was of another nation. I was blatantly breaking international rules by leaving the country. If I was caught doing so I would be arrested. If I failed to make it back to the Surf, I would also be fired. But were it not for Bianca, I would not have embarked upon the sea those three and a half years ago. Were it not for Bianca—who literally begged, bribed, and stole for me—I would not have even been hired. I felt this last effort on my part, for us, was warranted.

  The appointed hour came. Liberty began to tender in her passengers. Wave after wave of small craft disgorged bodies, but none were Bianca. As my stress grew—we were running out of time—so, too, did the heat. The wait became more and more intolerable on multiple levels. After the long walk, I waited an entire hour in the noonday sun. Sounds all melodramatic until you actually do it. I glanced yet again at my watch. We had only an hour left before I had to return.

  Finally a tender loosed a different round of bodies: predominantly Asians. This, then, was the signal that Liberty had unloaded all her passengers. And there she was: my exhilarating, vexing Bianca. She bounded lively from the tender then, when the afternoon struck her, closed her eyes and stretched like a cat. Her magnificent legs flashed, revealed high from a boldly slit, body-hugging dress of fiery red. She dropped her head to the side, hair tied high to open a long, sumptuous neck to the caress of the sun. She looked gorgeous. When she opened her eyes, they met mine.

  But this moment of connection was different. We had more intent than time. She took my hand and skipped towards the village. We strode along a street lined with cafés, bistros, and boutiques. I pushed for a coffee so we could talk. She pushed for a boutique so she could shop.

  "Just one!" she said, even as she flit inside. Grudgingly I followed.

  She danced in the shop, gleefully whirling around the shoe racks. Bianca passed from partner to partner, teasing each before spinning off to another suitor. She passed me only long
enough to hand off her purse.

  "Come on," I said roughly in Romanian, hoping to catch her attention with her native tongue. "Let's go to the coffee shop. We need to talk."

  "Soon!" she replied in equal tongue.

  "Acum," I growled, meaning 'now'.

  But she didn't hear me. She was already flirting with another rack of shoes. A middle-aged black couple watched her dance with open admiration. They confided aloud in English—they were American by their speech—and apparently presumed I and Bianca were not. The man said to his wife, "Now that is a sexy woman. Will you look at her? I'd go shopping with her any day." He got an elbow in the ribs, but didn't care one whit. Nor was he the only one to openly admire Bianca's playful romp. In fact, I was the only one present who didn't enjoy the show. And boy, did I not.

  "This is why I love ships!" Bianca finally said to me—in English—caressing the leather belts on a wall rack.

  "Shoe shopping?" I snapped.

  "Shopping," she agreed lightly. "I love the constant change. I'll never get tired of all new, all the time. I've wanted to come to Cannes for months, but could never get off the ship. But now that you've come...! These amazing ports are even more amazing when they're shared."

  "The only sharing going on right now is that I'm holding your goddamn purse."

  The constant change she spoke of I understood, but I seriously questioned if she got the subtle irony of what she was saying. Love of change, my ass!

  Then she said it. She said what I knew she was thinking, what I feared she was thinking. "I wish Regatta was here to see this store!"

  "Who's Regatta?"

  "My best friend on Liberty. She's my assistant waiter and wonderful! She'd like Cannes, even if you apparently don't."

  So I was now on par with her new assistant waitress. She would have preferred to share this amazing port with her new friend, not the man she had enjoyed a torrid love affair across continents with. That wasn't real enough, apparently. I had come here to put our relationship all out on the table, once and for all. She had come here to shop for shoes.

  Everything I had tried to do for us no longer mattered to her. Rather, it didn't matter enough. And at that moment the disrespect I felt, real or not, deserved or not, led me to the conclusion that it no longer mattered that much to me.

  "I've got to go," I said, thrusting her purse back.

  "Da," she agreed. "Me, too. The tender to Cannes is really bad. I'm so glad I came this time, because I don't think I'll be able to again."

  She skipped back to the pier, humming happily. I can only presume that the entire forty minutes she waited for the tender—a wait I used to share with her but this time chose not to—Bianca was still humming, buzzing about her amazing time in Cannes. I'll never know. That was the last time I ever saw Bianca.

  Chapter 13. Casablanca, Morocco

  1

  The Bay of Naples was certainly world class, but I hated working there. I was getting used to handling many different nations' customs officers, but not the Italians. They were hideously corrupt. Bribes were so high for offloading artwork in Sorrento—not to mention the price to prevent the artwork from 'disappearing'—that it became cheaper to pay Sundance its exorbitant late fees and offload later. The nearby Isle of Capri was even worse. This wasn't just the usual bribery of petty individuals. This was the Mafia—with a capital 'M'.

  "The Mafia is oppression, arrogance, greed, self-enrichment, power, and hegemony above and against all others." So described the Italian magistrate Cesare Terranova. Yeah, he was murdered by the Mafia. For the Mafia did, indeed, still murder judges, priests, and children. It is not a monster of Hollywood fiction, but in reality one of the world's most enduring criminal organizations. Though the term Mafia is specific to Sicily, the label is liberally applied to organized crime the world over. So, technically, I never dealt with the Mafia in Sorrento. Those assholes were the Camorra.

  They were worse in Capri. Courtesy of a rather convenient law—whether edified or merely understood, I never found out—only a certain union of tenders were allowed to dock on the island. If you tried tendering in with your own boat, you would have to pay through the nose, or be denied access by the port authority. They did not bandy words, and nobody in their right mind would argue. The Camorra controlled all the tenders, of course, in a kind of crooked union set up worthy of Tony Soprano. Because the tenders were so incredibly beautiful—their cover story was maintaining Italy's proper prestige—getting fleeced was almost worth it for the ride. Almost.

  But worst of all was Sicily itself. Ground Zero. Palermo.

  Adaptability has ever been the key strength of the Mafia. While the mainstay of protection rackets, known in Sicily as 'the pizzo', never went out of style, trafficking in drugs came and went. In vogue now is defrauding the national government through legitimate economy. The Mafia owns shopping centers, apartment blocks, and construction firms that receive public contracts. Bribes, kickbacks, and outright theft by politicians allow widespread theft of European Commission funding destined for Sicilian economic development. In this manner, hundreds of millions of euros are funneled to the Mafia each year.

  Walking the streets of Palermo, the Mafia's power was clearly seen. I was shocked at all the old, war-torn buildings left as slums since the 1940's, while noble structures were razed and replaced with modern crap. This was the result of the Mafia's post-WWII rise in dominance. They began by infiltrating the building trades—carpentry, plumbing, and the like—and then bought their way into most government-run agencies. Thus all urban planning is undertaken by criminals for their own gain. The Mafia, indirectly, rebuilt nearly half of post-war Palermo.

  Monkey business was not confined to the city. When Wind Surf docked in Palermo the first time, the Mafia had been ready. They boarded, prepared to fleece us for all they could. They had experience, they had a plan, and they had the audacity to enact it.

  Venerable, yet smiling, Captain Turner had gone on vacation. His temporary replacement was the playboy Captain Bixby. Like George Clooney, he was grey-haired handsome. It was Captain Bixby who provided us with a secret weapon.

  The day came, the port approached. Most of us quaked in our boots at the thought of a proverbial assault from the Mafia. How would they come at us? Who would they target for extortion? How could we deny them? Even before we docked, a pilot craft pulled up alongside Wind Surf. Two men boarded, one claiming to represent the port authority and the other a customs officer. Both men were slender and olive skinned, with oily black hair. Their shoes were as sharply pointed as the lapels on their uniforms. There was no question they were Mafiosi: pre-boarding was unnecessary, as was sending two men, as was demanding free espresso. They swaggered onto the ship like they owned it.

  Francois escorted them to the lounge, looking surprisingly deferential. While browsing for the best spot, the two men pointed to a table by the windows. Rather, they were intent on the table beside a blonde woman who was tall and slender and stunningly beautiful.

  "Oh, of course," Francois said with a meek giggle, only then noticing the passenger reading a magazine.

  "Not surprised you wouldn't notice," one said, referring to Francois' flamboyant mannerisms.

  Trying too hard to appear macho, Francois snapped his fingers and shouted for espresso. The display was a weak one, a fact that did not go unobserved by the Mafiosi. Flustered at his failure to impress, Francois shook out two cigarettes and offered them. He glanced around surreptitiously, eyeglasses flashing in the sun. He looked almost frightened. Quickly producing two fresh packs of cigarettes, he slid them across the table and said, "With my compliments. I have a personal... connection... for cigarettes."

  The men accepted, of course. They lit up. Soon an officer came by, informing the hotel director that the captain required his presence. Francois all but leapt from the table. Once alone, the two men smoked comfortably in the sun and relaxed. After several minutes elapsed, they grew bored. They shared a vulgar fantasy about the beautiful woman wh
o sat nearby. She was oblivious to what they said, for they spoke in their native tongue—not even Italian, but Sicilian. Secure from eavesdropping, the Mafiosi freely expressed themselves.

  "This hotel director is like putty in our hands. You see how scared he was?"

  "Yes. A 'personal connection' for cigarettes? That will be our target."

  The lady at the table next to them quietly set aside her magazine and departed—for the bridge.

  On the bridge, Francois and all the department heads anxiously awaited her return, for this was Mrs. Bixby. Though appearing a natural for the Swedish Bikini Team, she was in fact Italian. And she spoke Sicilian. So while pretending to be reading, blithely unaware, she had understood every lewd word they said. Francois had planted her in the lounge, anticipating their adversary's macho behavior. He had intentionally played an effeminate, cowardly fool, and thusly outmaneuvered them.

  "Tobacco, then," Francois said to those assembled. "Last time they went after alcohol. Janie, that's you. Make sure all your cigarette inventories match the hard count you did last night. I don't care if your numbers are right or wrong, as long as the hard count matches the paper inventory. Even one extra pack of cigarettes and the customs officer can claim you're smuggling tobacco."

  Resuming his usual, unflappable self, Francois began giving orders. Dimitar was to double check that all chips were locked in the casino office. Rick was to triple check that cash equated the number of treatments in the spa. I was to lie through my teeth. "If they target you, be prepared to lie convincingly about the value of everything," Francois said.

  The customs officer did take a stab at my department, but one look in the chaotic art locker was enough for him to move on to easier prey. And that prey was Janie. Because my name was also on the gift shop paperwork, Francois ordered me to help Janie in the gift shop. I arrived in the nick of time. For after verifying that the hard count was accurate, the two Mafiosi had resorted to baser tactics. They were threatening to hurt Janie.