The Girl Beneath the Sea (Underwater Investigation Unit #1)(18)

“I haven’t talked to him in a while. Maybe a couple years?”

I didn’t know the man like Dad did, except that he worked on our boats and had a temper and a drinking problem. As a kid you don’t see things as clearly. “Do you have any contact information for him? It looks like he sold the boatyard a while back.”

Dad takes out his phone. “Let me see the number I have for him. Winston was always having financial problems and changing his phone. Don’t get me wrong, Sloan. He’s brilliant. He used to work for the navy before he had the yard. He freelanced for builders up in Newport News.”

“Patching boats?” I reply.

“No. Building them. Specialty craft. Torpedoes. Remotely Operated Vehicles. A lot of secret stuff too. I know he worked with a contractor that did stuff with Naval Special Operations, but his drinking got in the way. Got worse when the wife died. Lost him his security clearance.”

I never knew this side of him. I just knew that he was the guy you took your boat to, told him how much money you had to spend, and let him figure a way to make it work. He was clever, I’ll give him that. His boatyard was filled with random junk you’d never expect to see. There were old RVs he’d buy for cheap to salvage the septic systems . . . even airplane parts.

I took Winston’s cleverness for granted when I was a kid. I thought all boatbuilders were that resourceful.

Dad sends me Winston’s contact information, and I save it to my phone.

“Did Stacey stay in the business?” I ask.

“I think she may have worked around the office, but she never got into the mechanical side, if that’s what you’re asking. I think she hated boats.” He shakes his head. “Sad. Just sad.”

I dial Winston’s number. A moment later I get a mailbox-full message.

“Anything?” asks Dad.

“No. Let me try texting.”

A second after I get a notice that my message can’t be sent through.

It looks like he’s off the grid. Did this happen before or after Stacey was found dead?

“Nothing,” I tell my father. “Know anybody who would have talked to Winston recently?”

Dad stares down at his beer and starts to peel away the label. “Nope.”

Nope is Dad’s tell for when he’s lying.

“Nope? Or no?”

Dad grimaces. “I haven’t talked to him . . .”

“Pop. This is a serious situation. Talk.” I put just enough edge into my voice.

He reluctantly answers, “Karl.”

“Uncle Karl? Were they . . . ?” My words trail off at the suggestion that Winston may have been involved with my uncle in some kind of trafficking activity.

Karl’s currently serving a three-year sentence for a parole violation. The first time out, he seemed clean, but he started working boat charters that took him outside his probation area. His first probation officer let that slide as long as Karl took him on the occasional charter. It was a great scheme until he ran into a coast guard inspection that happened to include a DEA agent on board who ran my uncle’s record and realized that he was about ten miles farther out than he was officially allowed.

Things have been pretty rough for Karl ever since.

I was hoping to avoid this, but it seems I have no choice. I send a text message to a friend in the US Marshals Service.

“Who are you texting?”

“I’m seeing if I can go talk to Uncle Karl,” I reply.

“That takes weeks to arrange. Why not just call him?”

“He has a harder time lying to me face-to-face.” A message bubble appears on my phone. “I can get in to see him at FCI tomorrow,” I tell Dad.

“Sometimes I forget that you really are a cop,” he says.

“Hopefully Uncle Karl forgets that too.”





CHAPTER TWELVE

HARDTACK

The Federal Correctional Institution in Miami is a minimum-security prison intended for nonviolent offenders with a low probability of attempting to escape—which means it resembles something between the prisons we see on television and an inner-city high school. Its alumni include Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega and boy-band producer Lou Pearlman, who served time for a Ponzi scheme.

The part that movies generally fail to get about prisons is their antiseptic, bureaucratic feel. The jails and prisons I’ve visited have felt more like college admissions offices than gritty, ironclad, Gothic castles. Maybe it’s different up north. But down here they remind me of public schools with cots.

Ben Simmons, the US marshal who helped arrange the visit, ushers Uncle Karl into an office. I could have gone through the warden, but it’s easier to keep the conversation private this way.

“I’ll be outside answering calls,” Simmons explains. “If you need anything, let me know.” He leaves the door open a crack to be safe.

“What’s up, Catfish?” Uncle Karl greets me with a warm hug.

Man, he’s lost weight. He still has his dark tan, but his eyes seem strangely sunken. Either he’s having a health problem, or he’s using something. I decide to shelve that conversation for another day.

He’s uncuffed, as is typical around here. I motion for him to have a seat. “You have enough in your account?”

Prisoners are allowed to buy extra food and snacks with a prison account.