They hit the water and the cold took all Caden’s attention.
Montana surged over the low waves like an otter and dived under the big seventh wave.
He took a breath, slid beneath the wall of water and pushed forward against the surge of sand and seawater, hearing the roll of the surf like a roar in his mind. Then he was up on the other side, beyond the breakers, bobbing on the swells. On this side, he could clearly hear the man’s cries. Terror throbbed in every broken call, mixed with longing for the absent Arrabella.
Caden trod water for a moment, orienting himself. Then the depth of the water coupled up with her odd question. Sharks. She had been thinking about sharks. That’s why she’d checked for blood.
He shivered and struck out across the water after Montana. She was swimming strongly towards the boat with an economic style that would give a swimmer endurance rather than speed.
The boat was a double-decked luxury craft, maybe thirty-two foot long. He’d seen plenty of them in the Keys, the Mediterranean, even the Caspian Sea. There’d be a master cabin in the bows and a kitchen/lounge area all fitted out with brass and polished wood. The navigation deck/cockpit would have the latest in sonar and radio communications and a canopy to protect its rich owner’s head from the elements. All layers of padding against the open sea. Why they even bothered leaving land....
He swam towards the boat anyway, because Montana was right—it was clearly listing, with its nose down in the water. In between strokes, whenever the water wasn’t in his ears, Caden could hear the owner still calling piteously for Arrabella, for rescue.
By the time he reached the boat, Montana had already heaved herself up over the side and onto the deck. No point trying the diving ladder at the stern. With the bow dipped so sharply, the ladder was up out of the water.
He gripped the gunwales and flexed, bringing himself up over the edge, streaming seawater. He landed in another four inches of it.
“Sir, can you hear me? Sir!” Montana was up in the cockpit already.
“Help me!” he cried.
“We will,” she assured him. “What happened? Where are the life vests?”
Caden sloshed through the water to the ladder and began to climb.
“Vests?” the owner queried.
This close, Caden could hear the effects of alcohol in his speech. “Booze and boats, god save me.” He stepped onto the cockpit deck.
“I’m afraid it’s even better than that,” Montana said softly. She stepped aside to reveal Arrabella’s admirer. The man was slouched in the captain’s chair and all three hundred pounds of him was wrapped in anchor chain. He stared up at Caden with eyes that showed bloodshot.
“Jesus wept! He’s tied up like a goddamn turkey!” Caden said. He stared at the spaghetti nest of chains.
“There’s a padlock here.” Montana rattled the big lock, up by the man’s right hand, which was strapped to his chest by the steel. He’d clearly done the wrapping himself and contrived to snap the padlock shut with the limited motion of his hand.
“Where’s the key?” Caden demanded.
The man swallowed audibly. “I don’t...know,” he whimpered. Then he threw his head back and bellowed to the sky; “Arrabella! My love!! My ooonly love!!”
Caden rolled his eyes. The man was smashed. Totally.
Then the whole boat groaned beneath their feet and the deck tilted another degree or two towards the bow. “Well, we’ll just have to untangle the chains,” he decided. “If he did it himself, then it can’t be that difficult to undo.”
“I’ll call the police.” Montana turned to the thick stack of electronic equipment and began turning dials and snapping switches.
Caden traced out the chains. If he could find where they were anchored to the boat, he could release that point, and they could pull the guy off the sinking boat, chains and all. “What’s your name, big guy?” he asked, ducking his head beneath the swivel chair to map out the flow of chains.
“Patrick?” His booze-soaked speech made it sound like a question.
Above him, Caden heard Montana speaking into the handset. Her voice was calm, measured.
“So, Patrick...you sink your own boat while you’re still on it. I’m guessing you’re not doing it for the insurance.”
There was a pause while Patrick processed that. “I wanted to die...y’know?” He belched loudly. “Arrabella!...I didn’t mean it!!”
Montana crouched beside him. “The police are on their way.”
Caden pushed back on his heels, to see under the chair. “These chains go down to the deck.”
The deck tilted a little more, the timbers groaning ever more loudly under the unnatural strain.
“We’ve got to get this boat evened out,” she declared, and got to her feet. “You fix the chains. I’ll fix the leak.”
Caden clambered down the ladder while above him he heard Montana speak. “Patrick. Patrick, you have to listen now. How were you going to sink the boat? What did you do?”
Again, the long silence while Patrick constructed his answer. “The captain’s cabin. The honeymoon suite, y’know?”
“You were getting married?” she guessed.
To Arrabella. Caden shook his head as some of the pieces fell into place.
“A-rra-bell-a!!” Patrick wailed piteously.
“Patrick. Patrick! Stay with me now. Are you listening? Patrick?”
Another belch. “Yeah, I’m ah-listening.”
“What did you do in the captain’s cabin? Did you loosen the seacocks? How are you bringing water onboard?”
“Axe, man. Right through the middle of the bed. Yup. Destroyed the sumbitch.” Another silence. “Had to do it three bloody times. Floor underneath. Then another one ‘neath that.” A hiccup. “Then the water came in.”
“Did you shut the door, Patrick?” Her question was softly put. “When you left, did you shut the door of the cabin?”
Smart question. She was guessing the cabin wall was a watertight bulkhead. If it was, then it explained why the boat was dipping at the bow. All the water was building up in the cabin, dammed up behind the wall. It was possible the boat wouldn’t sink much further once the cabin was fully flooded.
Then Caden found the other end of the chains flowing from the cockpit above. “Well, I’ll be...”
“What is it?” Montana asked sharply.
“Arrabella...!” Patrick crooned.
“The chains run down below decks. I think he’s pulled them out of the anchor hold and left the end of the chains bolted to the bulkhead. If I can get to the hold, then I can maybe unscrew the bolts.” He didn’t bother mentioning that there was a good chance the bolts were rusted into place and a blowtorch wouldn’t move them. He’d worry about that later.
“I’m sorry, Arrabella! Forgive me!”
Caden ground his teeth together. “I’d just love it if he’d shut up.”
“Go. I’ll shut him up.”
She turned back to Patrick. “Patrick, tell me about Arrabella. What happened?”
Caden waded to the below-decks door and elbowed it. It swung sluggishly through the water and he looked down the gangway. The water sloshed against the walls about waist height. The chains snaked down the gangway, running towards the bows. Of course.
“We was getting married. Sunday. Sunday was our wedding day. We was supposed to be on honeymoon today, y’see? Arrabella...she’s beautiful...” Patrick began.
Caden lowered himself down into the gangway, until he was on solid flooring. The water lapped about his hips.
Behind and above, Patrick’s voice continued. “It’s all her bloody parents’ fault, y’know. God, she looked beautiful, walking up that aisle...”
“So you did get married?” Montana prompted him.
Caden disconnected from the conversation and studied the way ahead. Four steps and the gangway opened up into the main cabin. Inside the cabin, the water echoed every groan and shiver of the frame as it adjusted to the unnatural angles and pressure exerted on it by the flooding.
Directly ahead and down at the end of the sloping floor was the bulkhead and door to the captain’s cabin. The bulkhead was waterproof, but the door wasn’t. Water was spraying from around all three edges that were above the rising water line.
“Not good,” Caden murmured. The door looked like it would give way under the pressure at any second.
He turned around to trace the anchor chains to their source, as they curled around the wall behind him and down another short gangway. He climbed down three of the steps, testing the level of the water. It was within a foot of the ceiling just there—he would have air most of the way, because the floor was rising.
He rested his hands against the transom over the door, preparing to push himself along the corridor using his hands on the roof.
That was when the cabin door behind him gave off a metallic shriek. He spun to look.
The lock didn’t just give way. All the pressure behind the door sent the metal latch across the room at Mach speed, as effective as a bullet and just as deadly. It came right at Caden.
He threw himself backwards, sinking into the water for whatever protection it would give him.
The latch struck him in the sternum, beneath the left breast and right over the heart, which wheezed with the impact. It was exactly like being struck by a big bullet. He was thrown backwards, to land on his ass in barely six inches of water.
The level quickly rose around him as he lay collecting his thoughts. He looked down at his chest. There was a deep impact cut where the door latch had hit. Raw meat showed in the half-inch crater. Blood was starting to pool.
No sharks inside the boat, he told himself. He spared a fraction of a second to wonder how he’d go getting back to the beach, but his more immediate concern was to avoid drowning.
The water was pouring down the four steps like a mountain stream in a spring thaw. Now that the cabin door was open the water was leveling itself out again. It would distribute itself about the boat, spreading out into every available pocket.
As he lay there, it trickled into the wound on his chest and the sting of salt was enough to launch him to his feet.
Well, at least the floor was becoming horizontal again. But he could see that, very quickly now, this lower level was going to be completely filled.
He pushed forward against the rushing water, digging in his heels. It was going to be a close race. Step by slow step, he made it to the stairs, fighting against the tidal flow of water. The water was up to his shoulders now, but seemed to be subsiding. He began to climb the steps, feeling his way slowly.
At the last second he realized his mistake. With the water running to the back of the boat, it was bringing the boat slowly back to a normal angle. The water accumulated at the back, evening out the load. Abruptly, the boat dropped its fanny into the water with a slap and the water in the corridor Caden stood in instantly filled the last of the space at the top.
As soon as he realized what was happening, he snatched as large a breath as he could. Then there was nothing but cold seawater around him.
He swam forward and up the steps into the main saloon cabin. There was a touch more light through the portholes there and he let himself rise to the ceiling. It was his fervent hope that the water had not reached the saloon’s ceiling yet. That snatched breath hadn’t been a full one; he wouldn’t make it to the gangway and up to the deck.
His nose and chin bumped against the ceiling.
No air.
He clamped down on the need to swear even in his mind, because the effort would use up oxygen. Already he could hear his heart loud in his ears as it worked overtime to compensate for the diminishing oh-two in his system. He also damped down the fear. If he kept his head, he’d make it out. The door was that way, just turn around and swim towards it. There’ll be a big square of light. Look up, you’ll find it.
When the hand clamped onto his elbow, he nearly gasped aloud with surprise. He gritted his teeth together, fighting to hold his breath, and turned around.
Montana’s white shirt was glowing in the gloom. Her hand moved quickly up to his shoulder. Then firmly, it pushed down. Insistent.
Little black dots were bouncing around in front of his eyes now. He was close to passing out, so did as she was insisting, fighting against all his instincts to do it. He let himself sink down in the water, his feet touching the carpeted floor of the saloon.
Then her hand slid under his arm and tugged up. He pushed off with his feet obediently.
And his head rose up into a black pocket of cool air. This time he did gasp. And pant. The air was foul with the stench of rotting fish and was the sweetest air he’d ever breathed. As his oxygen-starved muscles and mind recovered, he put together what Montana had done and laughed aloud. His laugh echoed back at him, flat and muffled.
She’d tipped a bait bucket upside down and carried it down to him, with precious air trapped inside it. It would’ve taken pure muscle to fight against the overturned bucket’s buoyancy and bring it below the surface.
She was tugging on his arm now, drawing him along. He reached up to grip the edges of the bucket, to hold it steady. It had to stay vertical or the air would spill out of it. He’d only get a few more lungfuls, anyway. Already the air was starting to feel warm and stale as he used up the oxygen in it.
When he kicked the riser of the first step up to the deck, he took a last deep breath, let the bucket go and looked around, blinking against the sting of the salt.
She was swimming up to the deck. Her own breath would be close to depleted by now.
He followed her up, hauling himself along by the banister and suddenly his head emerged into cool, fresh air.
“—do something! The water’s getting higher...for Christ’s sake!” Patrick was flat-out panicked now.
Montana was standing knee-deep in water on the main deck. The curtain of her black hair streamed water as she watched him emerge from the cabin. She had lingered to make sure he made it, even though Patrick’s bellows were hard to ignore.
He had intended to climb the ladder and go sort out Patrick, but when he got close enough, Caden found himself reaching for her, wrapping his arms around her and...just holding on. He closed his eyes and let the terror of those few seconds before she had arrived with the bait bucket play back through his mind. A shiver rippled over him.
“Smart, tough, and quick thinking. I’m glad it was you here, Montana.”
“I guess partners sometimes have their uses, huh?” As he let her go, she stepped back and looked up at him. She smiled a little, then turned and strode through the water to the chromed ladder up to the pilot’s deck, while Caden dealt with the little frisson of shock she had delivered.
Partners?
For years, he had worked solo by choice. For a start, there were very few people that were interested in his very personal agenda, and the few that might feel any sort of dedication to his cause weren’t physically capable, or smart, or tough, or gutsy enough....
He watched Montana climb the ladder to the upper deck. Yeah, if he had to have a partner, Montana was one of those rare people who might possibly fit the bill. If he had to have a partner, that was...and why was he even considering it? He shook his head and headed for the ladder himself. Time to put Patrick out of his misery.
Montana was studying Patrick’s chains again. “If we can’t release the chains, what about picking the lock?” she asked as Caden stepped onto the deck.
“You know how to do that?”
She shrugged awkwardly. “Well, I’ve read about it in a book and there’s some stiff wire on the radios there....”
He shrugged. “We have to try.”
“Why don’t you try lifting the chair out of its base?” she said.
“What are you thinking?”
“Without that chair beneath him, it’s possible we can slide him out of the chains from below.”
He took another deep breath, enjoying the feel of his lungs inflating. “Let’s go,” he said and turned to the chair.
“Omigod, it’s up to the third rung!!” Patrick kicked and struggled inside his chains as the boat gave another shudder and settled further into the water.
“You were telling me about the reception, Patrick,” Montana said smoothly, warmly. Caden saw her glance at him. “Three hundred guests,” she said. “They rented out the whole Hillarys Boat Harbour Clubhouse for the reception.”
He wasn’t sure where Hillarys Harbour was, but guessed it was one of the city’s water ports. That explained something else.
“This boat was going to be for your wedding night, right, Patrick?” he asked as he got on his hands and knees beneath the chair. “That’s why you took out the bed.”
“Oh man.” Patrick took a deep, wobbling breath. “I’ve been such a fuckin’ idiot.”
“Stay cool,” Caden told him. “What happened at the reception? When did it start going wrong?”
“It didn’t go wrong. That’s just it. It went right to plan. Everything. Even my thing.”
Caden wrinkled his brow as he peered up at the underside of the chair. “What you mean, ‘your thing’?” he asked. He pulled his head out. “Montana.”
“Mmm?” She was bent over the padlock, working with her nose almost touching it.
“I think if we can lift the whole seat part of the chair it simply lifts off the swivel post.”
“He’s gotta weigh two hundred and fifty pounds, Caden. Then there are the chains, the chair itself.”
“How strong are you?” he asked.
She touched Patrick’s shoulder. “How much do you weigh?” she asked him.
“Seventeen stone. I think.”
“What’s the American translation of that?” Caden asked Montana. She’d been here longer than he had, after all.
She shrugged. “Two hundred and forty pounds, give or take. Come on, let’s try. We’re almost out of time here.”
He glanced at the deck below. The water was swirling around the fourth rung. Two rungs to go and it would be up to the cockpit floor.
“Let’s try, then.” He put his arms underneath the seat of the captain’s chair and Montana matched him on the other side.
“Give the word,” she said.
He took a deep breath. “Now!”
They both heaved upwards and miracle of miracles, the chair eased up four inches, until the chains snapped taut and stopped them from lifting it any further.
“Down!” he gasped. They dropped the chair back onto the post. “Goddamit!”
Montana massaged her forearms. “Then it has to be the lock,” she said. There was no despair in her voice.
“Another rung, ohmigod, Arrabella!” Patrick strained against his chains, but there was no give in them, no mercy.
“I hope it was a very detailed lock-picking book you read,” Caden said.
She bent back over the padlock.
“I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die!!” Patrick was kicking out, wriggling like a beached fish.
“Caden...?” she asked softly.
He knew what she wanted. “Patrick,” he said. “Tell me about the reception. What was your ‘thing’? Patrick? Keep still a moment, huh? Let Montana work. Tell me. What was the thing?”
Patrick took a deep, rasping breath. “The envelopes, man. Y’know?”
“No. Tell me about them.”
“I had one stuck beneath every single chair at the reception. Then, when it was my turn to make my speech, that was when I told them.”
“Told them what?”
“To open the envelopes.”
The sound of a distant motor alerted Caden. He searched the billowing surface of the sea and spotted an approaching cruiser. The Marine Patrol.
“About time!” he breathed.
“It’s been eight minutes since I called,” Montana pointed out.
Eight minutes? Caden blinked.
“Oh god, oh god, it’s at the top!!!” Patrick blubbered. His whole body seemed to flinch and shiver.
Caden looked over his shoulder. The rest of the boat was now fully submerged. All that was left was the top deck they stood upon. “Montana.”
“I know.”
“Ohmigod!!” Patrick wailed.
“There are pockets of air. It won’t sink like a stone,” Montana murmured.
“Arrabella!”
“Patrick, the envelopes. What was in the envelopes? Deep breath, big guy. Tell me about the envelopes.”
“Pictures.”
“Photos? Of what?”
“Arrabella. Fucking my best fucking man.”
Caden saw Montana’s chin lift in surprise, but she immediately returned to the padlock. She was keeping her priorities straight.
He rubbed his eye with the heel of his hand. “You knew she had been sleeping with the best man and you married her anyway?”
The police cruiser had seen them now and was heading at full speed towards them. Patrick’s bright blue, bloodshot eyes were filled with tears, as he looked at Caden. “I didn’t know until two days ago, when the detective brought the pictures to me.”
“You hired a detective?”
He shook his head miserably. “Her parents did.”
“But he brought the pictures to you?” Caden felt stupid, unable to grasp what Patrick was telling him.
“He thought I should know. He wanted more money from me.”
“Nice,” Caden said with a grimace.
“Wait, no, back up a second,” Montana said. “Are you telling me her parents hired a detective to catch their own daughter having an affair with the best man?”
The tears in Patrick’s eyes glistened and trickled down his cheeks. His chin wobbled. “They were trying to catch me.”
“With their daughter?” Caden asked, totally bamboozled now.
“No, with the best man,” Montana said, straightening up. “They must have been pretty sure to spend that sort of money on a private dick. Right, Patrick?”
His voice was very small. “Right.”
The police launched sidled very gently up beside them. “Hello down there! What do you need?”
“Tell me you have a pair of bolt-cutters on board,” Caden called.
The officer leaning over the gunwales looked back over his shoulder, called a comment and looked back. “No, nothing that could bite through chain.”
“Know how to pick locks?” Caden called. “Better make it quick. I figure we have maybe three minutes, max.”
“Oh, Arrabella, what have I done?” Patrick moaned softly.
Another discussion on the launch. The officer looked over his shoulder again. “What?” he said sharply. Then he looked back at Caden and spread his hands almost apologetically. “Apparently, you’re sitting right over a sandbank here. It’s so shallow, you’re probably going to bottom out before it reaches his knees.”
Caden could feel his eyes widening almost comically. Montana jerked her head up and around to look at the launch. Her hands were still on the lock. “Excuse me, what did you say?”
“It’s the way the tide runs down this coast. There’s a sandbank right here and it’s only about twenty feet deep. We figure that with the draft on this boat, you’re going to hit bottom any tick of the clock.”
Silence.
Then, sounding like aural punctuation, at that moment the padlock in Montana’s hands gave a loud click and fell open.
A deep groan shuddered through the deck beneath them. The deck canted to one side, then grew still and solid. They had come to rest on the sandbank.