Rogue Angel 55: Beneath Still Waters (17 page)

Paul surprised her with a question of his own.

“Have you given any thought to what you’re going to do if this guy doesn’t let Doug live?”

What will I do? There’s no question what I will do
, she thought.
I will hunt the guy to the ends of the earth and make him pay for it
.

She didn’t say anything like that to Paul, though. She wasn’t sure he would understand. Instead, she kept it simple.

“Let’s just hope it doesn’t come to that,” she said. “If it does, I suppose I’ll cross that bridge when the time comes.”

The rest of the flight passed without incident and
they landed in Los Angeles on schedule. After making sure that their resupply and refueling was underway, Garin caught a couple of hours of sleep in the rear cabin so that he would be refreshed for the final leg of the journey ahead.

That couldn’t come soon enough for Annja, and she was practically frothing with impatience by the time Garin was given clearance from the tower for them to get underway.

Next stop, Tahiti
, she told herself as the blue waters of the Pacific rolled out beneath the aircraft and they took to the skies once more.

“What do you mean you can’t let us have the boat?”

Annja, Garin and Paul stood in the charter company’s office in the Tahitian capital of Papeete. Outside, it was a bright, sunny day with temperatures in the mid-80s, but since the clerk’s statement moments ago the temperature inside the room had gotten decidedly icy.

“I’m very sorry, ma’am, but as I said, you can’t take just the boat. You have to take the crew as well. They are the ones who will drive the boat.”

“But we don’t need a crew,” Annja argued. Pointing at Garin, who stood a few feet behind her, she said, “Our captain is an accomplished sailor. He will drive the boat.”

They’d arrived late the night before and gotten several hours of sleep in an airport hotel before rising early and heading out to the wharf where they were to pick up their charter.

That’s when things went a little awry.

The Polynesian clerk, little more than a teenager really, looked at Garin, then very quickly turned back
to Annja and shook his head. “The crew must go with the boat. That is the boss’s rule.”

Annja started to protest for the third time, but Garin gently pulled her aside and stepped in front of the counter. He put both hands on it and leaned forward, intimidating with his size but not overtly so.

“Is your boss here?”

The clerk shook his head.

“Can you call him on the phone?”

The clerk nodded.

Garin waited for him to do so, but the clerk just stood there looking at him.

Garin sighed. “Can you call him now, please?”

“Oh, yes, sir. Just a second please.”

The clerk picked up the phone, dialed a number and spoke in rapid-fire Tahitian to whoever picked up at the other end. He listened, then handed the phone to Garin.

Annja’s companion didn’t beat around the bush. “I will pay you three times the fee we’ve already negotiated if you’ll let me charter the boat without the crew.”

There was a pause and then Garin said, “Thank you. A pleasure doing business with you,” before handing the phone back to the clerk.

The clerk listened again, agreed with whatever was said and hung up. He looked up at Garin and smiled tentatively.

“If you give me a moment, I will prepare the paperwork.”

“Please,” Garin said, “by all means.”

The crisis averted, Annja took a deep breath and tried to relax.

Losing it now isn’t going to help anyone, least of all Doug
, she reminded herself
. Keep it together
.

When the details were completed and Garin had paid for the charter, the clerk, Teva, took them out to the dock to see their boat, the
Reliant
.

According to the paperwork, she was a Harmony 47 sailing cruiser, built in the Ponchin Yachts shipyard. It was forty-seven feet in length with a deep keel and a fully battened main sail that would provide a rich sailing experience.

Or, at least, that’s what the brochure said. Annja just hoped the thing was as fast as it looked.

The 75-horsepower engine was powered by fifty-five gallons of diesel fuel carried in the lower diesel tank, and they had arranged to have an extra twenty-five gallons of fuel stored in the holding tank for emergency use. They were also carrying fifty gallons of fresh water.

The boat had three double cabins, a cabin with two single berths, two toilets, two showers and even a dinghy powered by a 5-horsepower outboard motor that they could use to get to shore once they arrived.

All in all, it appeared that it would suit their needs rather nicely and Annja was pleased with her selection. Garin, too, seemed to be happy with it; at least he was smiling as he looked over the engines, sails and rigging, if that was any indication.

Teva had already stocked the boat with their requested items—a box of assorted tools, rope and a
few high-powered handheld flashlights in addition to water, food and diving equipment—so they were able to get underway as soon as he turned over the keys. Annja and Paul sat on padded benches on either side of the cockpit as Garin stood behind the wheel, deftly easing them out of their berth, then turning them toward the open sea.

The first several hours passed without incident. The weather was clear, the sea calm, and there was a strong wind. Garin got the sails up and had the boat practically flying across the water at a ferocious thirty-two knots, a slightly faster pace than Annja had originally estimated. The warm sun and the salt spray lulled her into a relaxed state and she could almost forget what they were there for.

Almost.

By midafternoon, however, dark clouds could be seen gathering on the horizon, and the radar was warning of a sizable storm headed in their direction. Garin gathered them to discuss the situation.

“We’ve got two choices ahead of us,” he told Paul and Annja. “We can try to find an island to use as shelter and wait out the storm or we can try to push through and hope we don’t get hit with the brunt of it.”

“What’s the radar say?” Paul asked.

“At the moment, if the wind holds steady, it looks like the main thrust of the storm will miss us.”

“But that can change, right?” Annja asked.

Garin nodded. “At a moment’s notice.”

“How much farther do we have to go before
reaching Wolf Island?” she asked. If they were close enough, she was inclined to just make a run for it.

Garin grabbed a chart out of a nearby drawer and rolled it out on the tabletop. He looked at it, and then pointed to a spot northwest of Tahiti, close to the Line Islands.

“We’re here,” he said. “That puts us about three-quarters of the way to our destination. We could take shelter here, on the leeward side of one of these smaller islands. Drop anchor, batten down the hatches, and just ride it out.”

“Or?” Paul asked.

“Or we can run north along this route,” Garin said, tracing a line on the map with his finger, “as fast as we can and hope we stay ahead of the storm.”

If there was ever a time I wished I had a crystal ball
.

But she didn’t have one, which meant she was going to have to rely on her gut. And right now her gut was telling her to push onward and not let the storm slow them.

“What do you think our chances are?” she asked, wanting someone else’s opinion on the topic so that she wasn’t relying on her desire to be right rather than the facts at hand.

“It’s hard to say,” Garin replied. “If the wind stays steady and the storm doesn’t change course, then I’d put them at sixty-five, maybe seventy percent in favor of outracing the weather. If the wind dies down or the storm changes course, then all bets are off.”

We’re running out of time
.

She turned to Paul. “Any ideas?”

He shook his head. “I know next to nothing about sailing and even less about tropical storms, so I’ll go along with whatever the two of you decide.”

That was all Annja needed to hear.

“We go for it,” she announced.

The decision made, they dug in and made preparations for the race to come.

Garin handed out life jackets—just to be safe, he said—and they pulled them over their heads and buckled them tightly about their waists. Then, and only then, did they begin securing what they could, not wanting to lose anything important if the weather got worse later on. When that was finished, they turned their attention to hoisting the jib, wanting to catch as much of the wind as physically possible to help them outrun the storm.

For a while things went pretty well. The heavy winds combined with the added sail helped to boost their speed another few knots, making Annja feel like an America’s Cup racer as they shot forward across the water. Their speed was exhilarating and the knowledge that they were closing in on their destination with every passing moment helped ease her anxiety somewhat.

Provided things stayed as they were, they would reach the island in less than three hours.

As it turned out, that was wishful thinking.

Just over an hour later the weather began to change. The radar showed that the storm had shifted
course and was certain to cross their path, probably within the next thirty minutes.

It didn’t take long for the seas around them to begin getting rougher, the swells growing in size and frequency, but the boat handled them with deft efficiency, much to Annja’s relief. Garin didn’t appear concerned by the inclement weather, so Annja tried not to let it bother her, either. She figured she wouldn’t panic until he did.

It didn’t occur to her that Garin might be worried but keeping a poker face so as not to concern his companions.

Annja stayed with Garin for a bit, watching him manage the situation with a deft hand. He worked the boat like the master sailor that he was, pulling every inch of forward momentum out of her, unwilling to admit defeat even as the storm grew around them.

When she became tired of that, Annja went below to find something to keep her mind occupied. She sat at the table and calculated their current position, marking it on the map for later reference. When she was done with that, she stared at the radar for a while, noting the shaded mass that marked the main thrust of the storm that was closing in on their position from the east. She tried to calculate how long until they might be within its grip, but she wasn’t adept enough at reading the Doppler data to figure it out and eventually gave up.

She turned her attention at that point to helping Paul secure anything that wasn’t bolted to the deck and was in the midst of doing that when she felt a
change come over the boat. For a moment she couldn’t identify what it was and then it came to her.

They were slowing.

She dropped what she was doing, turned and rushed back up on deck. Paul followed closely on her heels.

The sight that greeted them when they emerged from the companionway stole the voice right out of Annja’s throat.

The sky had lost its openness and had closed around them like a vice; the white clouds were now a deep gray interspersed with a green tinge that made everything look wrong in the odd-colored light.

Annja had seen sky like that once before on a trip to Alabama. It had been just before a pair of twisters came rolling through town, destroying everything in their paths. She could still remember the silence that had seemed to grip the town in the seconds before the twisters struck.

She realized that the same silence enveloped the boat now.

Annja looked up and saw that the sails were hanging limp, the wind having mysteriously dissipated just moments before. The only thing pushing the boat forward at this point was their earlier momentum and that was bleeding away quickly against the resistance of the water. Even the water seemed to have turned against them, going from brilliant blue to a flat, angry-looking gray, the color of a battleship.

She knew in that instant that they’d made a mistake.

They should have looked for shelter.

Garin’s urgent shout cut through her mental fog.

“We’ve got to get those sheets in!” he shouted. “Annja, take the helm! Paul, with me!”

Annja did as she was told, rushing to his side and taking the ship’s wheel in her hands. She barely had a grip on it before Garin rushed forward, snatching the crank handle from its storage place and dragging Paul with him as he went. Annja could feel the water pulling at the boat, fighting the rudder and trying to turn it. She tightened her grip on the wheel, keeping it steady, trying to give them time to do what they needed to do.

Garin slammed the crank into position on the mast winch and began winding it as rapidly as he could. For a moment nothing happened and Annja worried that the winch was broken—
did we check that before leaving?—
but then the jib began to come down, lowering itself a bit more with every revolution of the crank. Once it was low enough, Paul began gathering it around the bottom of the mast, lashing it into place. It wasn’t the best way of storing it, but time was of the essence and it would do for now.

They had just finished with the jib and were turning their attention to the mainsail when the sky was split with lightning and rain began to pour down on them. The temperature dropped fifteen degrees in the space of a heartbeat as a cold wind blew in along the forefront of the storm, making everyone’s job that much harder. Annja gripped the wheel tightly in her hands, doing what she could to keep the boat on course, as Garin and Paul fought to get the mainsail
down and stowed away before the storm could rip it to shreds.

A crash of thunder and a flash of lightning told Annja that they had lost the race.

The storm fell upon them like a vengeful ghost, determined to wrap them in its arms and drag them down into the depths.

The swells were ten feet high and growing by the moment. Annja tried to keep the boat at a forty-five-degree angle to the oncoming waves, knowing that if she let the boat turn too far to one side or the other and come broadside to the waves, the force of the water would capsize them. If that happened, it would all be over but the dying.