The Girl Beneath the Sea (Underwater Investigation Unit #1)(36)

It’s harder than it looks.

I kick to the surface, which isn’t that far, and orient myself toward the ramp, ready to start firing at anything that moves.

I pop my head out, finger on the trigger as I train the pistol up the ramp.

Nobody’s there.

This has to be a trick.

I scan the area behind the gate.

Empty.

Moving slowly, I pull myself up onto the ramp and squat with the muzzle aimed straight ahead.

Still nothing.

I stand and creep to the gate. The trucks are gone.

So is Winston’s body.

They hauled ass out of here fast. Did they decide I was dead? I wasn’t down there that long, was I? Did my superhuman breath-holding skills enable me to outlast them?

Don’t be silly. It was three or four minutes, tops.

Something red glistens in the moonlight. Drops of blood trail from the gate back to where the trucks were parked.

Holy crap. I was shooting blindly for cover. I actually managed to wing one. What are the odds?

Too high.

Something else happened.

I hear a splash of water behind me. Not the kind an alligator makes sneaking up on you, but the kind a wave makes when it hits the hull of a boat.

That’s how sharks find you. It’s not the blood or the electrical signals you give off; it’s the sound.

This sound tells me someone’s behind me.

The fact that they haven’t shot me yet means there’s a reason I’m not dead. It’s probably because they want whatever the other group was after. What happens when they realize I don’t have it?

I could take a few more breaths and dive back underwater . . .

Yeah, that’ll work. We’ll just stay there. Have our mail sent to the bottom of the stinking canal. Jackie can make friends with all the little catfish.

I spin with my gun raised.

A bright spotlight blinds me. I have to squint and look away.

The light goes out, and I try to adjust to the dark and see who’s there. At first all I can make out is a small fishing boat and a center console.

As my eyes adjust, a man resolves. He’s got a shotgun on his hip and a completely neutral expression on his face.

I don’t know if he’s here to rescue me or kill me.

It’s George frickin’ Solar.

Again.





CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

STARBOARD

“I don’t have it,” I say preemptively.

Should I have said something cleverer? Hell, Jackie could have come up with something more convincing.

Solar’s face reveals nothing. “I know. I’m also willing to bet you don’t even know what it is.” He lowers the shotgun and reaches down for his dock line. “Tie me off,” he says, tossing it to me.

I grab the rope midair, then cast an anxious glance back at the boatyard. “Are they coming back?”

“Maybe. Maybe not. It looks like they dragged a body with them. My guess is they’re afraid of someone coming back and looking around too closely.”

“That body was Winston,” I say. “This was his yard.”

Solar hops down from the boat and checks my knot. “I was afraid it might be him. Here.” He hands me his shotgun as he slides through the same gap I used between fence and gate.

I follow with the shotgun, still trying to figure out what’s going on. “Uh, you want this back?” I ask.

“Hold on to it for a second.” Solar picks up the pole Sewell used to search the pool and starts dredging the water.

“What are you looking for?”

“Another body. Tiago’s. Who knows what else?”

Solar knows a lot more than he’s telling me. He makes his way from one end of the water to the other, pushing branches out of the way and splashing water on his khaki shorts. “I used to clean pools when I was a teenager,” he says. “I had to go back to that when I got fired from my first police department.”

“Fired?” I’d heard he’d been let go in some kind of scandal. “And you still went back?”

More surprising, they took him back.

“Long story.” Solar sets the pole down. “I don’t think there’s anyone here. What about this stuff?” He walks over to the scattered items from Winston’s pockets.

“They didn’t seem to find anything. Whatever it might be.”

“I’m pretty sure they don’t know.”

“Who are they? How did you find this place?” I ask.

“Later.” He picks up the components and inspects them one by one. “Is that anything?” he asks, holding up a small, cork-size plastic plug.

I take a closer look: there’s a port on one end for some kind of electrical component. “I don’t know. It’s not a flash drive. It looks like some kind of marine electrical adapter or something.”

He surveys the dockyard. “We should be going.”

From the distance comes a police siren. “Somebody called the cops?”

“I did. Right after they spotted you.”

“You were here the whole time?”

“I followed you.”

“Me? What the hell? Why?”

“Because I figured you were going to do something stupid. And you didn’t disappoint me.”