The Water Keeper(92)

Gunner looked up at me and whined. I placed my hand on his head and tried to comfort him, but comfort was hard to find. We skimmed across the water, chasing the demon boat. After fifty minutes, the Dry Tortugas came into view in the distance. I’d been looking at them on my chart since I’d left the beach, but now I was laying eyes on them in reality. The fort rose in the distance. Farther west, a large yacht sat parked. Well lit. A hundred fifty–plus feet in length. Probably closer to two hundred. A party on the fore and aft decks.

I studied it through my binoculars. Several tender yachts were anchored nearby. The demon boat idled up to the larger yacht’s stern. Two men from the yacht carried something about the size of a human body off the smaller boat. Then somebody hopped off and onto the stern, shaking hands with someone on board. Interestingly, they kept the two engines running.

They didn’t intend to stay. I didn’t have long.

Just then my satellite phone rang. I didn’t have time to talk to Bones, but caller ID read “Unknown.” Below that, the description read “Wi-Fi call.” I answered. Her voice was shaking, and when she spoke I knew she was struggling to find clarity. “Padre—” Fear echoed across the line. “I want off this boat.”

Angel. “Where are you?”

She whispered. I could hear commotion in the background. “I . . . I don’t know.”

“Can you see out?”

I heard movement. She whispered, “Blindfolded. Siri dialed for me.”

“Where are you in the boat?”

“My hands and feet are tied. We’re not moving. Boat’s not rocking.”

“How long have you been there?”

“I don’t . . . don’t know how long.”

“Can you hear anything?”

“Men talking. They . . . Padre, I’m pretty messed up—”

“Hear anything else? Anything at all?”

“I think another boat just swung around us. I can hear the engine.”

That might have been the demon boat. “Make yourself invisible.” I heard commotion in the background. “Angel?”

Her voice was shaking. Her whisper lower. “Padre?”

“Yes.”

Her next words sounded with finality. “Tell my mom I’m sorry. Tell her—” She whimpered and the line went dead.





Chapter 45


Time was growing short. I guessed the demon boat had come to pick up Angel and deliver her to the buyer. Cuba or Bimini. Maybe somewhere in the Gulf. I circled behind the island, putting the fort between the yacht and me. I tied off at the wall, and Gunner and I crept around the seawall, staring at the yacht anchored about a half mile in the distance. I pulled on my fins and locked my phone in a watertight Pelican case just big enough to hold it.

I climbed down into the water and looked at Gunner. “Come on.” Gunner launched himself in the water, and we began swimming. My plate carrier and all the weight attached to it, not to mention the AR slung across my back, pulled me down. The thought of Summer and Angel pulled me up. But it did little to alleviate the drag. We swam a hundred yards. Then two. Then two more. I could hear voices on the decks. We swam within a hundred yards and clung to a thirty-six-foot Yellowfin anchored in about six feet of water. Possibly a client’s boat. I held the ladder with one hand and slid the other beneath Gunner, giving him a break. His eyes were trained on the yacht. The name on the back read Pluto.

Most would read that and think of a cute Disney character. But Pluto was the adopted Roman name for the Greek god Hades, god of the underworld. The message was clear. “Welcome to hell.”

I dove to the bottom and disconnected the quick-connect of the Yellowfin’s anchor chain. The quick-connect would hold some twenty or thirty thousand pounds, but it was designed with a pin that unscrewed relatively easily on the off chance that the anchor became hung up and needed to be sacrificed to free the boat. We swam quietly. With the current flowing in our favor, I let it drift us toward Pluto. I dove again, secured the quick-connect to the larger yacht’s anchor, and watched as the thirty-six-foot Yellowfin settled into place. The captain would never know he had a problem until he tried to leave and started dragging the smaller boat with him.

I swam around the starboard side, in the shadows, and snaked a three-quarter-inch stern line toward the stern of the demon boat, securing it to the U-bolt just above the surface of the water. The stern was dark, so I lifted Gunner and placed his feet on the aft deck. He shook and stood looking at me. I climbed up and tilted my AR to drain the water out of the gas tube. If I did have to depress the trigger, I didn’t want it to blow up in my hands.

Inside, music thumped, lights flashed, and voices sounded. If I charged in through the back door, things would get loud quickly and I’d risk hurting innocent people. Not good. I told Gunner to stay, and he looked at me like I was crazy. “Okay, but keep your eyes open.” He made no response. Other than his eyes were already open.

We crept up the side walkway and climbed the steps to the third story and the captain’s deck, which was empty. I guesstimated there might have been fifty or more people aboard. I’m no expert at making things go boom, but I needed a diversion. A loud noise accompanied with enough damage to cause these people to want to get off this boat.

Below me, on the second level, was what I like to call the frolic deck, where two dozen men and women either swam in the pool, soaked in the Jacuzzi, or reclined on one of the loungers displaying various degrees of public affection. Some were clothed. Most were not. Many smoked. Everyone drank. In one corner stood a group of men smoking cigars. The red glow plugs sticking out of their mouths matched the intent in their eyes. Given their body language, I judged them to be customers and not crew. Directly below me, the DJ was working to create some sort of mood.