Caribbean's Keeper (10 page)

“Point Alpha has some great fishing. I caught twelve just the other day. You should check it out. Call me when you’re back inside the reef line,” Mickey said and hung up.

It seemed simple enough. Cole wondered if all the coded language was really necessary, but then again Mickey was one of the pros who wasn’t sitting in jail and he probably knew best.

Cole pulled the GPS from his pocket and highlighted Point A. Moments later, the GPS drew a straight line in that direction and Cole whipped the Intrepid around and back to the south. He pointed at the sea buoy marking the main channel and again opened the throttles up to a full plane. At 30 knots over the ground, he was cruising and still hadn’t opened her up all the way.

Passing the channel markers at the mouth, the boat surged up and down now with the open swell. Cole slammed the throttles down and she lurched ahead, only the last few feet of her hull even touching the water. She was hard to control and took even the gently rolling swells with difficulty.
Too much power,
he thought. Cole braced his lower back against the seat and his feet against the console to keep himself in place. After ten minutes, he’d had enough. The boat was making 43 knots over the ground but the ride was brutal. She felt like a bull at a rodeo, surely hell bent on kicking him off. Cole settled at 30 knots for the rest of the trip.

He stopped twice, just as Kevin had shown him. Scanning the horizon and the sky, he was happy to see no lights but the stars and lingered each time to take a gulping breath of the nighttime air. He sighted Cuba just after two in the morning. It was nearly three when he was within shouting distance of land. Point Alpha was outside Havana but not so far that he couldn’t see its lights to his west. Paralleling the coast, the GPS got him within 50 yards of a small beach in an exposed cove. He nosed the boat in towards the 30 or so yards of beach and felt her drive the deep V-hull into the sand. He smelled the exhaust of his engines first then as the breeze caught up with him, the familiar smell of a tropical night took hold. The moonlight bounced off palm fronds as they gently played back and forth as Cole looked around for any signs of his cargo.

A flashlight came on in some tall grass just beyond the sand. Cole toggled the navigation lights on and off three times then left them off, as he’d done all night. Bodies emerged onto the sand and towards the boat. Sure enough, Cole counted 12. They were all dressed in the same manner as he’d always seen from
Delaney
. Dirty clothes, holes crudely patched with yarn, and worn-out shoes. Cole knew someone had money back home to pay for this trip and so long as he held up his end of the bargain, their life of destitution would soon be over.

With all 12 up and over the bow, they settled in various places. One man remained on the beach until Cole had backed her away then he disappeared back up the beach and into the grass. In such a small cove, Cole put his port engine in reverse and his starboard engine ahead to spin her around in place. The nose came around wildly and Cole smiled at the amount of power at his fingertips. Some of the migrants lost their footing as the bow spun around and Cole apologized as best he could in Spanish, saying, “Lo siento.” Then he smiled.

An older man smiled back at him and mumbled something to the rest as they reached around for handholds and prepared themselves for the ride north. Cole again spoke. “Vamanos.”
Let’s go.

The older man shook a fist in the air and repeated Cole’s words. “Vamanos!” His enthusiasm was contagious.

Cole motored at half speed until clear of the points of land that blocked his view. Scanning left and right, happy to see not a single boat in his vicinity, Cole opened her back up to 30 knots and pointed north. He had more than half a tank of gas and once on speed, he felt good about the trip so far. It was just after three in the morning.

The first hour went off without a hitch. The passengers had mostly sat down, but a few stood up, their arms braced in any way they could find to steady themselves as the boat leapt up and over the swells marching in from the west. Cole thought himself lucky that they ran with the Gulf Stream. Had they run from the east, they would have stood up tall against the current and made the ride unpleasant.

Approaching five in the morning, Cole noticed several of the Cubans looking back to his port quarter and pointing. Three of them were talking. Cole glanced over his shoulder quickly but couldn’t see what they were talking about. They were looking at him now and asking questions in Spanish. Over the wailing engines, he couldn’t hear what they were saying. He looked again over his left shoulder and saw a red flashing light above the horizon, not too far behind him. He looked ahead to process what it might be. Checking his GPS, he was 25 miles from the sea buoy. He had less than an hour to go.

Cole looked again behind him and clearly saw the silhouette of a helicopter. It was low and clearly flying along with him. “Fuck,” was all Cole could manage under his breath. He felt butterflies again. He yelled out over the engines, “Sientate,” thinking that it meant something along the lines of sit down. It must have, as the migrants all sat and pressed their backs against the sides for support.

Cole punched the throttles. The boat gave him another ten knots and he was making 40 over the ground. She felt unsteady, as she had before, but now Cole needed the speed. With only her back end dancing off the tops of waves, the boat jolted from side to side, forcing Cole to spread his legs further apart to absorb the impact.

He was still heading north, towards the Key West sea buoy, and the wind stirred up tears in the corners of his eyes. The Coast Guard station at Key West would respond, that much he knew. It was anyone’s guess whether or not they had small boats coming from Marathon and Islamorada. Worse yet, he had no idea what Customs and local police were doing. He knew well enough though that the crews of more than half a dozen units were now being roused from their sleep and running towards their boats, all to give chase for him. There was even a chance
Delaney
was out that night and Cole wondered if Wheeler was preparing his boarding team somewhere in the distance.

Eighteen miles to go. Cole had to assume the worst. Boats were already under way and making best speed to close in on him. His chances rested on outrunning them, something his Intrepid was capable of. But if they were intercepting from the north, there was little he could do but thread the needle between them and hope to shake them off in shallow water. He strained to think clearly and analytically about his plan, but each time the boat soared off the back end of a wave and slammed back down, he would lose his most recent thought and had to begin again. He pushed the throttles again, but they were already maxed out.

His best plan was to risk the boat by running straight over the reef, a route that no lawman would take. They wanted to catch him, but they wouldn’t risk their own boats or their lives by running over the reef at night. It was a gamble in that there was no way to tell where the coral heads sat. They could be six inches or six feet under the water. The move was smuggling’s version of a Hail Mary throw by a desperate quarterback. If they didn’t follow him over the reef, he’d have enough time to run her up somewhere and go from there. This all assumed that he made it through their initial intercept and lucked out with a deeper pocket over the reef. If he hit the reef, the boat would tear open and wreck, throwing him and his passengers into the air.

The helicopter was still behind him and flew a lazy pattern on his stern, going from one side to the other. He focused his eyes ahead, scanning for the blue lights of law enforcement but saw none. If they were blacked out, he wouldn’t see them until they were right on top. Cole was 12 miles from the sea buoy.

At eight miles, he saw the blue lights—two sets of them almost side by side, they were heading directly at him. He pushed the throttles again, but they were still maxed. He scolded himself for doing so as it was nothing more than a game of nerves at this point. Looking back to his left, he couldn’t see the helicopter. To his right he couldn’t see it either. He looked back left and right again and it was gone.
Perhaps they’d run out of gas and headed home?
he thought. Cole knew he lucked out on that one. His odds were now improving.

Four miles from the sea buoy, he could make out the wake from both the boats coming out to meet him. He kept on his course directly at them, with a closure rate of more than 60 knots. Suddenly, one broke off to his right but the other kept on with a high-speed game of chicken. Seconds later, one boat passed in an instant close enough that Cole could clearly see the faces from the boat staring at him. His Intrepid rolled hard to the right then went completely into the air off the wake of his pursuer. It landed horribly and nearly threw Cole to the deck. Recovering, he made a 30-degree turn to the east and pointed now at the unlit line of coral only a mile or so ahead. Looking back to his right, the first boat had come around and was now almost abeam at less than a mile. It must have been U.S. Customs as it seemed to match Cole’s speed and slowly closed the gap as it angled in. Cole was impressed for a second at the coxswain’s timing of the maneuver. The reef was less than a mile away. The boat crew pursuing him would have to act quickly to stop him. The first boat, belonging to the Coast Guard, had lost too much ground in its intercept and was no longer a concern despite their pursuit from a half mile or so back.

Cole turned 15 degrees back to the west to buy some time from the closing pursuit. He looked at his GPS just as the blue dot marking his position crossed the reef. He held his breath and clenched the wheel for the impending impact with the reef, but it never came, and she glided right over it and into the shallows. With the swells subsided, he had another three knots of speed and screamed towards the dark coast ahead of him. He turned harder to the east towards the darkest islands. Key West was far to his left and some smaller islands were directly ahead. He didn’t look back, but knew that the Customs coxswain had broken off the chase at the reef. He brought the speed back to 15 knots.

He yelled ahead to the migrants to hold on and waited for the boat to hit bottom. When she finally did, it came on slowly at first. He heard and felt the propellers digging into the sandy bottom. As the hull caught hold it slammed him against the console and his chest pressed hard against the wheel. His feet came up and off the deck as she dug in and finally came to a stop. One engine was still grinding at half speed and kicked up a horrible sludge of water and sand. Cole killed the engines, and it was quiet for the first time in hours. Cole’s ears were ringing. He looked back behind him and saw nothing but the calm waters of the protected shallows as it trailed off into the darkness behind him.

The migrants, all 12 of them, were already hopping over the side and into the knee deep water. They understood dry feet meant
terra firma
and they literally ran up to the beach, only 20 yards in front of them, where they huddled up close. Somewhere to the east, a dog was barking, reassuring Cole that he wasn’t far from civilization. He basked in the silence for a few more seconds before he heard the faint rumble of a helicopter. More than likely it was state or local police on their way to track him and his cargo down. He hopped over the side, into the knee-deep water, and made his way up to the beach, mad that his new running shoes were now soaked.

Chapter 5 – Points South

THE MIGRANTS WERE GONE. They’d surely been briefed about what to do in the event plans changed and clearly, the plan had changed. Cole was standing up under the overhang of some palm fronds as he fumbled for his phone—the dog still barking in the background and the helicopter still a ways off. Dialing Mickey, Cole tried his best to explain what had happened.

Mickey cut him off before Cole even got a full sentence out. “What the fuck man, you woke up the cavalry. Where are you?”

Cole thought about it but didn’t know. “I dunno. I’m somewhere east of Key West. The cargo is good and dry, but I don’t know where they are at. They split pretty quick.”

“OK. You go hide. Let things settle down. I’ll call you in a few hours.” Mickey pronounced the word
you
as
jew
.

Cole hung up the phone and tucked it back in his pocket. Mickey wasn’t much help and Cole was mad at himself for letting things get so out of control. He meandered his way around the small beach a bit until finding a trail, then followed it some 50 yards or so until he spotted some lights. Proceeding carefully, Cole figured out that he was butted up against someone’s backyard. Sure enough the lights were all on in the house and Cole ducked behind a patch of palmetto grass and sat down in the cool sand, his back against the trunk of a palm tree. It was early morning and the stars were still bright with enough moonlight to see a good ways in any direction. Cole knew he was not in a good spot and the chopping sound of helicopter blades in the distance was his greatest concern.

Cole told himself to be smart. His mind got away from him for a second and he forced his thinking to slow down. He was facing the house, the beach behind him, and he saw a gravel driveway to the right. Cole knew cops would be here soon and hiding in someone’s backyard was not a good option. Bent at the waist, he hustled over to the driveway, ducking behind trash cans and a minivan. The driveway led out to a road and he made a quick run for it to get some distance between him and the boat. The gravel crunched under his wet shoes as he ran and Cole felt the onset of blisters on his feet. He could hear the helicopter closer now and as he approached what must have been the main road on the Key, he could see the helicopter to his east, its spotlight combing back and forth.

He took off in a full sprint, hitting the main two-lane road where he saw another gravel drive opposite the one he’d just come up. Cole sprinted north 100 yards or so until it opened up in an empty lot. There was a rocky beach just to the north then dark open water beyond that. If it was anything like the rest of the Keys, it would be knee-deep water for hundreds of yards and full of shells, rocks, and the occasional coral head. Swimming for it wasn’t an option—the helicopter would spot him in minutes. But going back wasn’t an option either and Cole exhaled loudly, fighting back the first tinges of desperation.