Alive at 5 (Entangled Ignite) (8 page)

“Hey, kids.”

Fingers tapped her shoulder. She jumped.

“Don’t mean to break up the dance floor grind, but I’ve got someone here with something she says you wanted to see.”

George? She pulled back and whipped off the blindfold. What the hell was her cameraman doing here? And with Rita by his side?
Holy shit.
Her heart sped up even more.

“Can’t it wait?” Zack had both fists on his hips.

“For your sake, dude, I wish it could.” George grinned at them both, but his smile seemed tight. “Sam, Rita here came knocking on your motel room door and then mine saying you wanted her to bring you this DVD as soon as she got off work.”

“I did.” Sam pulled away, knowing she should be embarrassed to be caught in Zack’s arms, but more interested and concerned about what they were about to find on Rita’s DVD. “Rita, this is Zack Hunter. His uncle died on one of these adventure vacations.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Rita pulled a DVD out of her purse. “Then you’re the one who needs to see this.”

Zack’s jaw clenched and his shoulders hitched up. “What the hell is going on here?” He stepped away from Sam and gave Rita the once over. “Who are you?”

“She’s a waitress I talked to at a diner near our motel while I was doing some work. I actually talked to a number of people, trying to find someone who had come in contact with previous vacation groups, but Rita was the only one who had useful information.”

Zack’s eyes narrowed and his voice lowered. “What kind of information?”

“You’ll be proud of me, partner.” She reached out for Rita’s DVD. “While you and George we’re in those caves searching for evidence, I may have found a clue as to how your uncle died.”

Chapter Nine

Sam glanced around the sparse living room of the mobile home they’d driven to. The rickety, two-bedroom doublewide was hidden off a one-lane dirt road with no streetlights, way outside of town. This was where Rita lived? She pursed her lips. Too bad they didn’t have DVD players back at their motel.

She moved a wadded up T-shirt and a pair of faded black jeans from the couch to the floor and sat down. A weirdly upbeat George sat on her right, and a silent, brooding Zack sat on her left. The conflicting vibes had her stomach in knots.

Rita was fiddling around in her tiny, box-like kitchen.

Sam wrinkled her nose at what smelled like leftover meatloaf sprinkled with a hint of not-so-fresh kitty litter, and stole a quick glance at Zack. After the intimate moment they’d shared at the honky-tonk, she didn’t understand why he’d insisted on driving here alone. Especially when she told him about the DVD. The cool energy he was putting off right now was in sharp contrast to the heated lines his fingers had drawn on her flesh less than an hour ago. She shivered. What was with the guy?

She wanted to touch him and make that connection again, but Zack cleared his throat and yelled toward the kitchen, “Can we get on with this?” He sat forward on the couch, his hands clasped tightly in his lap, looking like a man ready to spring up and run out at a moment’s notice. He still wasn’t making eye contact with her.

“Sorry, Zack, I know you want to see that DVD.” So did she. Rita had told her about it at the diner, but had stopped short with details after her boss had yelled at her about delivering hot food to one of her other tables. “When Rita saw me reading articles on X-Force Adventure Vacations, she stopped to warn me to be careful. At first she wouldn’t say why, but when I told her about Maxwell and Jackson, she told me about hooking up a year ago with one of the X-Force vacationers passing through town, a guy named Michael Flint.”

Zack whipped around to face her, interest firing in his eyes.

Looked like Zack knew Michael Flint. Or had at least heard of him.

“Apparently, this Flint guy had some suspicions about what was going on at the adventure vacation company. Rita told me he wrote down notes in a journal. She also said he’d been diving with a guy from up north who never made it back to the surface.”

Zack’s body tensed. “The timing is right.” His gaze sought the silent, black TV screen.

“I’ve got Bud or Mic Light.” Rita walked into the living room with a beer in each hand.

“Bud. Thanks.” George took the beer, allowing his fingers to linger on her skin.

Rita smiled, her heated gaze traveling to George’s hands.

What was up with that? George was hitting it off with the waitress? She certainly gave off a friendly air, and up close, she was quite pretty, despite the hole in her apron and the grease stains on her skirt. Her living space gave away her financial situation—desperate.

An avalanche of bad memories along with a pang of sympathy rushed through Sam. How many times had the popular boys called
her
trailer trash while growing up? And look how far she’d come. With any luck they were all watching her on the evening news from the beat-up sofas in
their
doublewides.

Not that she was bitter or anything.

“How about you, honey?” Rita’s gaze landed on Sam.

She smiled, but the remnants of Grey Goose and Zack’s bizarre behavior had her stomach in a tizzy, so she declined.

Rita turned to Zack, who was still staring at the TV. “What about you, good-looking? What do you want?”

For a second, Sam thought Zack was so deep in thought that he didn’t hear Rita. Slowly, he acknowledged her. “I want the truth.”

Surprise washed over Rita’s face.

Sam had never heard that tone of voice from him before. “Zack,” she cautioned. If he was rude, Rita could ask them to leave.

“That’s what we’re here for, right?” Gone was the flirtatious playboy. “I’m not here to party. I want to know what Michael Flint knew about my uncle’s death.”

The waitress put the second beer down on the table next to Zack and sat in a chair across from him. “Oh, lordy, I’m sorry.” She kept blinking as she spoke. “I don’t know what Michael knew about your uncle’s death. I just know he thought something bad was going on with the adventure vacation company. He was always asking people to call him if they saw anything they thought might be shady. He never did go into detail.”

When no one spoke, Sam prompted her, “Go on.”

Rita continued. “One night Michael and I were watching a movie here, and he gets this call on his cell phone. He took it in the bedroom, but I wanted to hear, you know, so I put my ear to the door.” She shot a nervous glance at both Sam and George. “I thought maybe it was a wife or girlfriend. Like, I don’t do that shit, y’all. Anyway. I only heard bits and pieces. I think he said he couldn’t pull out now. He didn’t have the proof.”

“Proof of what?” Sam frowned. Now they were getting to the details Rita didn’t have time to tell earlier. “Was he an undercover cop?”

“I don’t know.” Rita shrugged. “Could have been. Had that air about him. Michael came rushing out of the bedroom that night and said he had to go. Then he hauled ass. Never saw him again.”

Sam had spent years learning how to assess people’s credibility in mere minutes. The way Rita leaned forward, the way she used her hands and made eye contact, convinced her Rita was telling them the truth. At least the truth as she knew it.

“Two days after Michael left, I’m cleaning up around here, and I find his backpack on a chair under some of my clothes.” She blushed as she peeked over at George again. “I tried to return it, but when I went to the hotel, the kid at the front desk told me Michael had checked out the day before and left town with the adventure vacation company. I thought it was weird, but I thought maybe he’d left it as an excuse to come back and visit me, you know. But then I thought, hell no. He never needed an excuse. He didn’t want no one to find that backpack. That’s what I think. I was going to track the company down, but the next day I heard on the news that a man named Michael Flint had died during a shark dive off the Bahamas.”

“What?” Sam straightened. Rita hadn’t told her they guy she’d been hooking up with had died! It made sense now why she’d warned her. Sam checked out Zack’s reaction and froze. The guarded expression on his face told her he wasn’t surprised at all. “You knew about Michael Flint dying?” Words flew out of her mouth, prickly balls of anger. “Why didn’t you fill me in that? Don’t you think it’s relevant?”

“Samantha, can we talk about this later?”

She stood and fisted her hands on her hips. A bonfire of bad feelings ignited in her belly. “And I was so excited to share this clue with you.”

Zack sighed. “How did you find this DVD, Rita?”

Rita hesitated, picking at her clothes. “I opened up his backpack and checked out what was inside, of course.”

“And?” Zack scooted to the edge of the couch. Both hands gripped the cushion’s edge.

“I found the journal and the DVD.”

Indignation still burned in Sam’s belly, but curiosity extinguished some of the heat. She took a long, deep breath and sat back down. “You’ve watched the whole DVD, right?” Her mouth had gone dry. She picked up George’s beer and took a swig.

“I’d like to see it. Now.” Zack motioned toward the TV.

Rita looked from person to person. “Do you think we should all watch it together?” Her gaze landed on Zack. “Or do you want to watch it alone?”

Zack’s shoulders sank. “No need. I already know how it ends.”

Rita took the cue and stood.

As she walked over to her small, lopsided kitchen table, the reporter in Sam took over. She fired off questions she hadn’t had a chance to ask earlier. “You kept the DVD all this time? For at least a year? Why didn’t you turn the DVD over to the X-Force Adventure Vacation Company?”

Rita picked up a simple camouflage backpack sitting on one of the kitchen chairs. “Michael obviously didn’t trust the folks working at X-Force Adventure Vacations, so why the hell should I? Plus, Michael ended up dead, and I don’t know if it was an accident or if someone at the company killed him because he’d been asking too many questions.” Rita headed back toward them with the backpack slung over her shoulder. “Where I come from, you keep your mouth shut and your nose out of other people’s business. That’s how you stay alive.”

Silently, Sam applauded her statement. Rita Wright was a smart cookie, with good survival instincts.

The waitress placed the backpack on the coffee table in front of the three of them. Sam stared at it, her suspicion growing by the minute. A Semper Fi patch was sewn onto the right side of the backpack. Michael Flint was a Marine? Military, just like Zack?

She waited, giving him a chance to say something about the patch. He didn’t even acknowledge it. He was too busy opening the backpack and pulling out a black, leather-bound journal. He flipped open the pages and started reading. To himself, of course.

She shot George a look, raising her eyebrows in a silent question. Shrugging, he remained silent.

“Rita.” She pressed on despite the urgent desire to wring Zack’s neck—right after she pulled him out of the trance-like state he’d fallen into. But maybe he would have told her about Michael Flint. George had interrupted them before the promised hour had passed. “Why didn’t you call the police if this DVD showed something incriminating?”

Rita picked up the DVD, and then stopped. “I don’t know that it does. You watch it, and you tell me. Besides, I’m on probation—doesn’t matter why. But if you even think about calling the police, we’re done here.” She shook the DVD at them.

“Play the DVD.” Zack’s eyes had gone dark.

A wave of empathy moved through Sam, washing away most of her anger. Zack was about to watch a beloved uncle die. He deserved a little compassion. Nothing hurt more than losing a loved one, as she knew first hand. Although her mother was technically still alive, in a coma she was more like the living dead. Every time Sam visited her, that harsh reality killed her a little, too.

She reached over and placed her hand on his, curling her fingers over his clenched fist. She gave him a gentle squeeze.

Zack didn’t return the gesture of affection, but he did turn to look at her. She pulled back a bit, startled by the haunted look in his eyes.

No one in the room said a thing as the DVD cycled and began to play.

Chapter Ten

Samantha’s soft touch surprised him.

Zack hadn’t told her about the death of Michael Flint. When Detective Johnson hadn’t mentioned Flint after Wentworth died, Zack had felt no obligation to fill them in.

Would he have mentioned it when he made his full confession after the hour she’d promised him at the bar? Maybe. Probably. Who knew? He’d never gotten a chance to find out just how serious he’d been about trusting her. And judging by the look on her face two minutes ago, he would have bet last year’s salary he’d never get another chance.

Now, he wasn’t so sure.

The gentle squeeze of her hand made him want to curl up in her arms to watch the video, the possible clue she’d found for him. Embarrassed, he pulled away from her.

She didn’t reach for him again. Which made him feel even shittier.

The sound of someone breathing through a regulator drew his attention to the TV screen. A diver descended through the waters of the Orange Grove Sink. The date on the screen indicated the dive had taken place on the day his uncle died. Zack tried to swallow, but the invisible obstruction lodged there would not go down.

The water and landscape looked much the same as it had on his dive earlier. Bubbles rose up from below through an increasingly darkening pool of water. The diver shooting the video wasn’t alone. Another diver was swimming below him, letting out air bubbles as he breathed. Michael Flint?

The video had obviously been shot with a helmet cam worn by the first diver. If that man was indeed his uncle, they were now seeing through his Uncle Jackson’s eyes.

He shuddered, suddenly chilled despite the lack of air-conditioning in the mobile home.

A second diver moved in front of the main diver’s helmet camera. His pulse picked up speed. “Can you pause the DVD?”

When Rita did so, he squinted, trying to find something about the new diver that would identify him. The full wet suit, bug eye goggles, and large regulator, along with the murkiness of the deep water, made it impossible to pick out details of a face. He knew what Michael Flint looked like. Flint had been a New York undercover cop, and he’d been investigating Scott Fitzpatrick’s death. It had been such a hush-hush investigation that even the local police didn’t know about it.

But Zack did. At the time, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement had been actively investigating Jackson’s death at Zack’s request. When the FDLE shifted their attention toward Flint’s death, Zack had been taken off the X-Force investigation all together. Too personally involved, they had told him. Well, tough shit. Here he was anyway. And Fitzgerald’s, Jackson’s, and Flint’s cases were still open, unproven, and unresolved.

The person captured on the video could have been Flint, but he could also have been any one of the vacationers diving that day.

He blew out air he’d been holding in. “Go ahead and push play.”

Proof. He needed proof. Or at least a good clue.

The diver and his dive buddy came upon the familiar sign with the Grim Reaper. The first diver with the camera surged ahead. That was exactly what Jackson would have done. He’d always wanted to be in the lead. At least his uncle, if it was him, was following a guideline that had already been laid down. By now, visibility under the water was severely limited, so all they could see on the screen was what the diver’s headlight revealed.

Further down the narrow tunnel, the main diver checked his wrist depth monitor. He held out the box-shaped device on his right wrist as if he
wanted
the camera to pick it up. Zack lurched forward. He drew in a sharp breath. “Pause.”

“What? What do you see?” Samantha’s voice cracked as Rita froze the picture.

“Look right above the computer console on the diver’s wrist. See the initials J.H.? Jackson’s initials are on the depth gage. I know that’s his. I was with him the day he bought it. The diver
is
my uncle.” Fingers of both relief and fear entwined deep in his gut.

“So, this is a clue.” Samantha’s eyes lit up.

“Where did his dive buddy go?” George scooted closer, too. “Your uncle is a hundred feet deep. Why doesn’t he look backward to check for his backup?”

Zack had no answer.

“Maybe he didn’t want to go past that awful sign,” Samantha suggested with a grimace.

Rita handed Zack the remote control. He pressed forward. A couple of times it looked as though his uncle did turn to check out what was behind him, but by now there was no sign of the other diver. He pressed play again. The readout on his uncle’s wrist now said a hundred-thirty feet deep.

“Shouldn’t he be switching to his primary tank now?” George asked.

“Is that important?” Samantha asked.

“Divers must breathe different mixtures of gas at different depths,” Zack explained. “You start breathing mostly oxygen, but at this depth you have to switch to a tank that contains a blend of oxygen, nitrogen, and helium. The combination allows you to breathe under the pressure of the water.” He didn’t really think she wanted such a detailed explanation, but frankly, he wanted to hear his own voice right now rather than the sound of his uncle’s laboring regulator. A slow horror was creeping up inside him, as if he were down in that cave, struggling to breathe right beside his uncle.

As if on cue, his uncle reached behind his head and maneuvered the switch that changed the mixture. He continued to swim inside the dark tunnel. Occasionally, he’d glance back. Zack rubbed his eyes, but knew nothing would change the outcome ahead.

Jackson had almost reached the area where George had freaked out.

The mechanical air sounds were getting more intense. Why was his uncle breathing so hard? Jackson had been in good shape for his age, and he didn’t look like he was overexerting himself. He’d just switched to his other tank. His heavy breathing didn’t make sense.

A sudden dread sank deep into Zack’s bones. “Something’s wrong with the other tank. He isn’t getting enough oxygen.”

“How can you tell?” Samantha’s voice sounded far away, even though she was still sitting right next to him.

“Listen to the way he’s struggling to breathe.”

The eerie sound of air bubbles being released into the water filled the room, followed by an electronic noise that sounded like it came from a robot, not a man.

“Elp.”

Zack turned his ear toward the TV. Had he heard right?

“It sounded like he said help!” George exclaimed.

“Maybe the sound came from his equipment?” Samantha said cautiously.

“Elp!”

Zack dropped his head into his hands, his elbows resting against his knees. The weight of that one simple word pulled down his shoulders. His heart felt like it was tearing in two. “Jackson obviously knew something was wrong.”

He probably also knew help wasn’t coming.

“What could it be?” Samantha whispered.

Zack could feel her leaning closer to him.

“The mixture of air in his tanks,” George said. “If Zack’s uncle wasn’t getting enough oxygen, he would pass out or have a seizure. Why didn’t he turn around and head back up? Where the hell did his dive partner go?”

All good questions. Ones Zack would never be able to answer. A lack of oxygen to the brain did cause divers to do crazy things deep underwater. He forced himself to keep his focus on the TV.

“But… If your uncle was able to make a sound like help, he couldn’t be suffocating, right?” Just as Samantha finished making that logical statement, little gasps rippled through the speakers.

Zack’s stomach plummeted. He couldn’t watch this. But he had to. He forced himself to keep his eyes open, though he wanted to shut them tight.

His uncle had stopped moving. He rested on the cave floor, his breathing shallow. With the limited light from his uncle’s gear, Zack found it difficult to see what Jackson was doing. But…he appeared to be moving his hands, struggling with something at his side.

Jackson turned his head and gazed down. That directed the headlamp toward a guideline hooked into a rock.

Zack shot to his feet.

“What? What?” Samantha asked.

He opened his mouth, but the response balled up in his throat.

“Jackson is tangled in a guideline.” George frowned. “Many times there’s more than one. When you can’t see very well, your gear can get hooked or tangled on someone else’s line.”

Jackson’s body twisted and turned in a frantic dance of desperation. The light on his helmet cam moved across the gray rocks like an out of control strobe in some liquid ’80s disco.

“He’s panicking,” Samantha whispered.

Zack desperately needed to hold her hand again. Instead of reaching for it, he collapsed onto the couch and watched the man he had loved like a father thrash around in the near darkness. His heart ached in a way it never had before. The pain choked him. Jackson tugged at the lines for dear life. The exertion no doubt made him suck in even more of the faulty mixture from the tank. Maybe his death really had been an accident.

Come on, Jackson, give me something
.
Anything
. He prayed for his uncle to show him something that could lead to an answer, like what had happened to his tank.

As silt danced around the dying man, a sandy veil cloaked him, but Jackson’s hands came up before the camera, and he gestured in a flurry of finger and hand movements. Sign language! Then the cloud of debris erased his hands from the camera’s view.

“That’s it!” He couldn’t stop the rush of excited adrenaline dumping into his system. He started to shake.

“That’s what?” Samantha asked.

“The end?” Rita whispered.

“The clue.” His mind anguished over the way Jackson had fought his death, but a new sense of purpose washed over him. The rush of excitement made him a bit nauseous and dizzy. He ran up to the TV and popped out the DVD. “I know what happened.”