Rusty met me at the rear deck and tied off the kayak to the only cleat still above water. She didn’t ask me why I was drenched, or about the gash in the side of the plastic craft. She didn’t ask me about John Milligan or if I’d gotten through to Sugar or anyone else on the cell phone.
She looked me over and seemed to know everything she needed.
“We’ve got a problem,” she said.
“I noticed.”
We were both gripping the spiral stairway that led up to the wheelhouse like a couple of commuters hanging onto subway straps while the train careened around a bend. The tilt of the ship was even more severe than it appeared from a distance. Navigating the roof of an A-frame would have been easier. I peered into the salon and it too was worse than I’d imagined. The TV was facedown, surrounded by the glitter of its smashed screen. All the furniture had broken loose and was piled against the port wall. Water three feet deep, the remains of Teeter’s breakfast mingled with the flotsam.
“It’s more than the ship,” she said. “We’ll right the ship. It’ll require some time and money, but it’ll be okay.”
“You’re taking it well.”
“Not much choice.”
“And the other problem?”
“That would be Mona.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I overheard her talking to the shooter.”
“You did?”
“Other side of the mangroves, twenty feet away. I caught a snatch.”
“Well, I heard the whole thing,” Rusty said. “Both sides. Then Mona and I had a little talk afterward.”
“Let’s hear it.”
“She remembered the woman. Name’s Sasha Olsen. Her husband died a few months back, and now her son’s at death’s door. Sasha blames it on radon gas, uranium, some bullshit. I didn’t follow that. But it’s related to phosphate mining and your damn family. So that’s what Mona thinks. Sasha’s playing avenging angel. Payback for her husband dying and her kid being sick. Wiping out the Bates family and anybody else who gets in her way—like my brother.”
We watched a squadron of pelicans skimming the bay.
“From the bit I heard,” I said, “it sounded like Mona was pulling the woman’s strings.”
“I heard what you heard,” Rusty said. “No question Mona’s trying to call her off. Flip her switch. But I can’t tell if she’s running things or not, and at this point, frankly, I don’t give a shit. If Sasha’s taking orders from her, then fine. It’s over, Sasha’s gone. We’ll watch our backs with Mona, get the hell out of here, sort it out later. Is that a plan?”
“And if Mona’s not running the show, then what we heard was her pleading, not giving an order.”
“Yeah,” Rusty said. “I like the first choice better.”
“You believe she’s dirty?”
“I honestly can’t tell.”
“Maybe I’ll give it a shot.”
“Yeah.” Rusty cut a look my way, then shifted her gaze back to the water. “You two seem to have such a nice rapport.”
“Where’s she now?”
“Last I saw she was up on the roof, off by herself.”
“The walkie-talkie?”
Rusty patted her hip pocket.
“And our other passengers? How’re they faring?”
She shook her head and sighed, then took a minute to fill me in.
When it became clear the Mothership was sinking, there’d been panic, shouting, name-calling. Apparently there’d been a slap, Rusty on Annette. Then even louder name-calling and threats. Holland sticking his camera in Rusty’s face until she snatched it away and slammed it into the wall.
“Wish I’d had a ticket for that.”
“It got worse,” said Rusty.
Holland, by God, was going to sue her for damages, pain, suffering. He’d take Rusty Stabler’s last goddamn nickel. His father happened to be a personal-injury attorney, best in Philly. He’d make it his life’s work to destroy her. And Annette chimed in. Her magazine had a shark pool full of lawyers who’d salivate at the thought of dismantling Rusty’s operation, selling that stupid boat to the junk man piece by piece.
That’s when Rusty ordered Annette and Holland to go cool off. They refused. Rusty gave them one more chance, but they refused even more snottily, so she grabbed their collars, hauled them to her cabin, and pitched them in and slammed the door.
“Both at once?”
“Both at once.”
“You’re some kind of strong.”
“I’m running on nitroglycerin, Thorn. Best not to fuck with me.”
Then I told her about finding Milligan’s body, leaving out the part about the shark.
She groaned, took a thin, whistling breath, and closed her eyes.
“I think he’d been drowned. I had a good look at his body floating in the water and I didn’t see blood or bullet wounds.”
“This drowning thing,” Rusty said.
“Yeah?”
“Mona says it has to do with how Sasha’s husband died, and the way her kid’s suffering. Lung cancer. Gasping for breath, suffocating.”
I looked off at the horizon. It was darkening in the north, some pink ribbons of sunlight in the west, sprays of gold and green shooting through the gaps. Not much daylight left.
Rusty said, “Like Sasha’s doing some kind of fucked-up poetic justice. ’How long can you hold your breath?’ Tit-for-tat bullshit. Make us suffer what her loved ones suffered.”
“Sink the houseboat. Get us in the water, take us under one by one.”
“Be a lot easier to shoot us. Like she did Teeter. Get it done and go.”
I shook my head.
“This woman’s not into easy. I think what she did to Teeter was only to slow him down. She probably meant to finish him in the water, drown him like she did Abigail Bates and John, but I showed up before she could do it.”
She looked at me for a long black moment.
“You got something in mind, Rusty? Some plan?”
“I want to get my hands on her,” she said. “Beyond that, no.”
“She’s strong. Milligan was no weakling. We have to do this smart.”
“You got a smart idea?”
“How’s your night vision?”
“What? Wait till dark?” Rusty said. “You think we have that long?”
“Twilight would be better.”
“To do what?”
“Fake her out.”
“Talk to me, Thorn.”
“You paddle out in the kayak, like you’re offering yourself up.”
“And where are you?”
“You’re towing me with a rope. I’m in the snorkel, mask, fins, I’ve got the dive knife. I’m a few inches below the surface. When you get close enough, you tug, I go down a few feet, circle past you, flank Sasha, and while you keep her busy, I pop over her stern.”
“Twilight,” she said. “Gotta be at least twilight. Otherwise she sees what’s coming.”
“Twilight, but not full dark. I’d never find my way.”
“It should be you in the kayak, Thorn. Me in the water. She knows you’re part of the Milligan clan. She’s not interested in me.”
“My way confuses her. You distract her long enough, it could work.”
“I’m going to have to roll that around.”
She reached out and poked a fingertip to my elbow.
“What happened to your shirt?”
“A brush with the wild kingdom.”
“Hell, I always liked that shirt. That was the doc’s, right?”
“You knew this shirt?”
She nodded. “Like losing an old friend.”
“I think it can be saved,” I said.
“Yeah?” She slipped a fingertip through the rip and touched my arm. “You think so, huh?”
“A little patching up can work miracles.”
She tilted her head, giving me a skeptical look. “What’re we talking about?”
“Shirts,” I said. “Mending things.”
Rusty worked her eyes across my face for a moment, then tried and failed to conceal a swallow. Her short sandy hair was riffling in the wind. Sweat had darkened her shirt, revealing the sharp outline of her breasts.
“All I wanted,” she said, “the only goddamn thing I was trying to do was take some people out here, explore some spots nobody’d ever seen. Sit up on that deck at night with those damn stars, a glass of red, shoot the shit after a great day of fishing. That’s all I wanted.” The words were thickening in her throat.
“We’ll get it back on track.”
“Oh, the ship can be salvaged. But when all this gets out, this disaster, my backers will run for cover, insurance canceled. Coast Guard’11 pull my ticket. This is the end, Thorn. Scratch one off the dream list.”
I was never very good at fake solace. She was probably right.
“Shit, I could end up like you, Thorn. Hermit in a cave.”
“It’s not so bad. You could try it for a while. Might grow on you.”
Her eyes clicked to mine, squinting to be sure she’d heard right. Like I’d uttered a proposal of marriage.
“It might come to that,” she said. “The mother of all last resorts.”
“Go ahead insult me, but you’re always welcome at Club Thorn.”
She blinked away the haze in her eyes.
“Christ, listen to the self-pity bullshit. Teeter’s in there with a blanket over his face, and I’m whining about the goddamn houseboat and my freaking captain’s license.”
We stood in silence, looking out at the bay, listening to the wind hiss around the hard edges of the ship like the whispery voice of evil.
I watched the next blue-black mass thickening in the northwest, clouds piling on the backs of other clouds, rising up.
“We’ve got to keep our focus, Rusty.”
“Yeah? On what?”
I reached out with my right hand and cradled her cheek.
“On the good fight.”
Her hands rose slowly and she gripped my wrist and seemed to debate it for a moment before letting her cheek settle against my palm. Her body softened, then a moment later she caught herself and drew back.
“Not now, Thorn. Take your famous charm upstairs, use it on your kissing cousin. And while you’re at it, find out whose team she’s on.”