Death By Blue Water (A Hayden Kent Mystery Book 1)

Praise for the Hayden Kent Mystery Series

DEATH BY BLUE WATER (#1)

“Kait Carson’s Florida is dead on in this action-packed mystery! The enviable setting, compelling characters, and the author’s expertise on diving make for a fresh plot and an intriguing story masterfully woven into a satisfying conclusion.”

– Krista Davis,

New York Times
Bestselling Author of the Domestic Diva Mysteries

“Dive in! This compelling, timely, and relentlessly suspenseful deep-sea adventure—with its undercurrent of chilling secrets—won’t let you go! Readers won’t come up for air until the very last page.”

– Hank Phillippi Ryan,

Agatha, Anthony, Daphne, and Mary Higgins Clark  Award-Winning Author of
Truth Be Told

“The highlights of this debut novel are the beautiful descriptions of the underwater dives as well the complicated details involved that protect the divers’ safety. The author achieves in making the appeal and beauty of recreational diving worth risking the many dangers surrounding it, strengthening the heroine’s character and making her a protagonist the reader will want to succeed.”

–
Kings River Life Magazine

“You get drawn into the action almost as if you are watching it in real time. I found it difficult to stay with the current story and not turn to the end to find out the conclusion! But all the twists and turns are worth it, and don’t give in, because you’ll enjoy the ending more if you wait. A great book, highly recommended.”

–
Any Good Book

Books in the Hayden Kent Mystery Series

by Kait Carson

DEATH BY BLUE WATER (#1)

DEATH BY DOUBLOONS (#2)

(Fall 2015)

Copyright

DEATH BY BLUE WATER

A Hayden Kent Mystery

Part of the Henery Press Mystery Collection

First Edition

Kindle edition | November 2014

Henery Press

www.henerypress.com

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from Henery Press, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Copyright © 2014 by Kait Carson

Cover art by Stephanie Chontos

This is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

ISBN-13: 978-1-940976-48-8

Printed in the United States of America

Dedication

For Gary,

who believed even when I didn’t

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

They say it takes a village to raise a child. It takes a universe to write a book. It’s a rocky road strewn with self-doubt alleviated by frequent surges of confidence. So many people stood beside me to bring these words to the page. I hope I don’t forget anyone.

Death by Blue Water
was born during NANOWRIMO. The National Novel Writing Month.  I was living in Maine at the time and wishing for blue water and the last scuba dive of the season. Instead of gearing up, I wrote it out. I’m forever grateful to NANO. It told me my story had legs.

I owe a huge debt of gratitude to my Crime Sisters, fellow members of Sisters in Crime and especially the Guppies Chapter who stand ready, willing and able to answer any question. This book would not have happened without their guidance, sharing and cheering.

Untold thanks to my first reader, Larry Ledford, who tells me if the story hangs together and points out the errors. I wouldn’t want to do this without you.

Captain Banny Thorne, if Cappy seems familiar, it’s because, well, he is. You taught me to love the sea, and especially a certain deep wreck. Thank you for your patience, kindness and indulgences.

The cast and crew at Henery Press. An amazing group of people who were brave enough to take a chance with an unknown writer.  Thank you, and special thanks to Anna Davis, my editor extraordinaire. This book came to life under your caring tutelage.

Finally, thank you to my family. My husband, Gary, makes living with a writer seem almost normal. He cheerfully fills the gaps I leave when my muse holds me hostage. Over the years he’s gotten used to odd dinner table conversation, strange looks from people in restaurants, and my quest for detail.

So many other people provided generously of time and knowledge. Thank you all. You made me shine. Any errors belong solely to me.

One

The warm blue waters closed over Hayden’s head. Pain, despair, worthlessness, fear, and confusion filled her in equal parts. She came to the sea for one of two reasons: to solve her problems, or celebrate and give herself the joy of concentrating on the miracle of the sea creatures that floated past. Today was about problem solving. Underwater, she shut out the noise and stress that pressed in on her from all sides. Sometimes she’d chase after a black grouper and try to pull his tail. She chuckled into her regulator at the memory of all the times she had the pleasure of sneaking up on the square-spotted fish ever so slowly and laying alongside. Then, with a flick of big fish’s tail, it swam away with the speed of light.

She was doing her first dive of the day. One of her favorites, a wreck named the Humboldt that lay one hundred and twenty feet beneath the waters off Marathon, Florida. Hayden considered it a good, reliable dive, and she’d done it often enough to be comfortable diving it alone despite its depth. The challenge was part of the healing process.

She said a silent prayer of thanks for Cappy. She dove with him frequently, and he knew her skill level. Few commercial captains would let divers descend alone. Hayden knew she needed the healing power of the water. She wanted to be free to concentrate on why Kevin ended their relationship, free to poke and prod the painful parts of her psyche, free not to worry about being responsible for any other diver.

Hauling herself hand over hand she followed the line that secured the boat to a floating buoy tied to the bow of the wreck. Reaching carefully over the fire coral-encrusted parts of the line, she grabbed the descent wire again. Hayden paused on the line once she got past the fifteen-foot mark. She glanced up at the underside of the dive boat and visualized Cappy, watching to make sure her bubbles kept moving. Smiling around her regulator, Hayden recalled the old diving adage that a bad day was when the boat above passed you on the way down and beat you to the sand.

The water was crystal today and the top of the wreck beneath her looked closer than eighty feet. She had a clear view of the wheelhouse, top of the bow, and the large cable holder that provided shelter for a gigantic moray eel. For a minute, air bubbling up from the wheelhouse made it look like there might be someone else on the wreck. Impossible. There were no other boats. Keeping one hand on the descent line, she rubbed her free hand over the glass of her mask. The bubbles had to be trapped air escaping from the boat or a trick of the tide.

Flipping herself head down and staying within reach of the descent line, Hayden looked for landmarks as she swam to the ship. She’d never been troubled by nitrogen narcosis, the dreaded rapture of the deep, but she knew the signs, and she knew the human body handles every dive differently. Looking for landmarks let her know she was alert. Yep, there was the toilet. Some wag had put it down right beneath the tie-on for the line. Over the years, it too sported a healthy coat of fire coral. Wouldn’t be comfortable for sitting.

Hayden slowed her descent to a stop at about sixty feet to get a careful survey of the scene below her. She heard the hiss and flow of her own breathing as she took in the nitrox gas. Idly she wondered if she could rent a rebreather for her next dive. That would let her silence the sound of her own breathing and become one with the water she loved. She checked her gauge, depth showed sixty feet and she knew by the knot on the line that was correct. Her tank was still showing full. Flipping to the “time before decompression stop required” screen on her computer gauge, she saw she had thirty-six minutes of non-deco time. Always a careful diver, she reached behind her and patted the belt that fastened her tank to her back. She’d seen them come loose in a back roll. If something went wrong at sixty feet, Hayden knew she could safely do a swimming ascent. That had been the deepest she’d ever been able to do it without drawing from her buddy’s air supply. Any deeper, she thought, and it would be sheer luck to gain the surface. And today, she didn’t have a buddy. One last check of her weight belt, a quick confirm that her mask was comfortable and secure and she turned her head down and kicked to the deck of the boat.

This dive could have a strong current. Today it had none so she free swam to the bow. Following her usual routine on the dive, she first went to the large gear wheel holding the cable to greet the moray. If he was home she’d see a lot of little fish. He wasn’t. Over the side she went diving deeper, following the ship’s profile to the stern. Once there she swam up a bit and went into the first hold. They’d been blown open for safety and she never went into an overhead environment. Not alone at least. They gave her the heebie-jeebies when she’d had to follow a buddy into one. Two tagged goliath groupers frequented the ship. She’d watched them grow larger over the years and, by this time, they seemed as curious about her as she was about them.

Hayden doubted they recognized her but it did seem over the years they had swum closer and closer, once even following her into the wheelhouse. The grouper couldn’t fit past his nose. A red-letter dive day. No grouper in the hold but she spotted a second toilet. This place was becoming an outhouse. Hayden paused in front of the second toilet and tried to imagine how they got these things on board. Swimming them down didn’t seem an option and it would take a dead aim and no current to place them by dropping them.

Over the side she went again, this time to the sand to see the giant screws resting on the bottom. The screws were brass and hadn’t discolored. For some reason they hadn’t attracted much growth either. It wasn’t unusual to see sand divers and jacks circling them. Whenever she reached the sand on any deep dive, she sat there for a little bit thinking. It was here, far below the noise of the surface that she reviewed her day, the first part of the dive, and anything that might be bothering her.

She looked up at the huge ship towering over her. Seeing no sign of any other diver, she picked up sand and sifted it through her fingers.

She glanced at her gauge again. She’d felt like she’d been sitting on the bottom for hours, but her gauge told her she had plenty of time. It wasn’t the first time she’d noticed that phenomena when she dove and she wondered if maybe she was suffering from nitrogen narcosis after all.
Narked,
as the divers say. Time underwater goes by fast and slow at the same time. Whenever Hayden dove, she felt as if she’d been in the sea forever, truly a part of the environment. When she surfaced after a dive, she felt as if the dive passed in seconds.

Shaking her head, she loosened the cuff of her dive skin and watched as sand poured from it, forced inside by the action of the mild current while she sat on the bottom. Looking at the stream of sand, she thought she’d probably collected enough in her dive skin to make the boat ride back to shore uncomfortable. Time to swim up and perform the last of her particular dive rituals. She crested the rail of the boat amidships as she planned.

Hayden looked up to be certain she wouldn’t strike the rusted rail. There, wedged in the door of the wheelhouse, was the smaller of the two goliath groupers. He probably weighed in at about four hundred fifty pounds. He swam backwards from the doorway and turned his huge fishy face towards her, opened his mouth so she was looking at his teeth, and he bonged. Something Hayden had rarely heard these fish do. It sounded like an underwater gong. It reverberated in her chest. Startled, she swam backwards away from him. A school of permit swam towards her from the deeper water. Maybe that got him excited.

Cautiously, breathing shallowly to control the noise, she swam closer to the huge fish. Last year she’d managed to brush her hand along the flank of one. This guy seemed agitated though. She had a clear view of his teeth. Even though she’d never heard of one biting anyone, she tucked her hands into her buoyancy compensator vest to be sure.

The wheelhouse had a door on the stern side and large oblong window holes around the port, starboard, and bow sides. Maybe the larger of the two fish, the six hundred pounder, had managed to squeeze in and gotten stuck. Maybe that was the source of the bubbles she’d spied earlier. Hayden swam around to the bow side and looked in the window. There was the nose of the smaller fish, stuck in the door as far as it could go. She glanced around the wheelhouse, the smallest of the three rooms in the tower. Another toilet—again she thought, how do they do that?—and a lot of spiny clams. The walls of the wheelhouse looked rusty brown. Hayden knew that was a trick of light. At this depth, she’d lost red, yellow, orange, green and parts of blue. In the light of a diver’s flashlight, the walls were a kaleidoscope of red and yellow coral. Odd, she thought, I’ve never swum over this room, only around it and looked in it. Someday, she promised herself, she’d see what the view was from the top of the wheelhouse. Not today though; the grouper had her spooked. For the first time, she wondered if she should have taken something to signal the captain with, and if she should dive this depth alone. Especially today.

The huge fish bonged again nearly causing her to hit her head on the top of the window opening. She caught herself just in time. The thought of a nasty cut filled with rust and coral made her shudder. She grabbed the sill to steady herself on the window rim and looked down to confirm she hadn’t struck the buckle of her weight belt. Her gaze swept past the floor of the wheelhouse under the window.

She wasn’t prepared for what she saw.

An eyeless face looked into hers, and a pale hand waved back and forth.

She screamed. The regulator dropped from her mouth.

As she drew another breath to scream again, she swallowed salt water and choked. Quickly she retrieved her regulator and jammed it into her mouth. Unable to help it, between coughing and gagging on the swallowed water, she screamed again, this time into the regulator.

She had to get a grip. Fast. Or she might not make it back up.

She looked again to determine if this was some kind of a macabre joke or a trick of the sea.

A body.

Under the water.

In the wreckage.

Gaining control of her emotions, a kind of curiosity overcame her fear.

The man wore pale colored swim trunks and no scuba gear. He looked bloated with gas. Small sea creatures had been at him. Leaning further into the window opening, Hayden cried out. A rope wrapped tightly around one ankle and encircled his legs. He could have gotten tangled up. The rope might’ve trapped him.

She remembered hearing stories of people tripping on lines and tangling in them on the way down. She searched the underwater deck.

An anchor lay in the center of the room.

The rope disappeared under the body.

How the hell did the anchor get in the middle of the wheelhouse? A current? Would’ve had to be mighty strong to move it sideways through the window and then have it end up there. The more Hayden looked at the corpse, the less sense the anchor made.

The man’s skin sloughed off as she watched, and floated in nearly transparent shreds towards her.

Bile rose to her throat, and she fought the urge to vomit.

The grouper bonged again. Hayden saw it struggling to get into the wheelhouse. For the first time she wondered about the dietary habits of goliath grouper. Did he bong because he wanted at the man, or because she wouldn’t go away? What did those giant fish eat?

She felt like she’d been down there forever.

Even at this depth, Hayden heard the captain rev his engine. Their agreed signal that she return to the boat, immediately. Still staring at the body, she wasn’t sure if Cappy called her because she was at the end of her dive time or because her bubbles stopped moving. Glancing at her gauge, she had her answer. There was very little time left for her to avoid decompression stops. She knew her computer would credit her with a bit more time during her ascent but it was going to be close. Fortunately, her tank held enough air to do a deco stop if it became necessary. Taking one last look at the poor man tied to the anchor, she began a slow, gentle ascent.

Hayden found herself gasping for breath. Looking at her gauge, she realized air wasn’t the problem, but it could be if she didn’t control her breathing. She was hyperventilating and fighting a desire to bolt to the surface. She slowed and told herself two corpses wouldn’t serve any purpose.

At sixty feet, half her deepest depth, she held her position for three minutes giving her body a chance to reabsorb the nitrogen that would be in bubble form in her bloodstream. Nitrox might lessen your chances of the bends, but it didn’t prevent it. She’d been diving a long time and seen too many people get hit to take a risk now.

The captain could see her ascent up the line. The water was clear enough that she knew he could see her hold position. Although he occasionally revved the motor, the sound had less urgency than it had before. At fifteen feet, she held her position again for another three minutes. By this time, her dive computer was content with her mathematically calculated nitrogen count and she could surface without causing it to lock her out and go to a blank screen. She looked up into the face of her friend and dive captain. She feared she might be swimming with the fishes for good if his face, blurred by the moving water, indicated his anger level.

Swimming past the fifteen-foot marker, she gained the ladder of the dive boat. Tossing her fins up to the captain, she mounted the ladder. Cappy’s anger was evident. In all the years she’d been diving with him, this was the first time he didn’t help her up on board. Instead, she pulled herself up the three steps and into the stern of the boat.

“Trying to kill yourself? That’s the last time I let you get off this boat by yourself. What happened? You’re not diving anymore today. Get your own self out of your tank. I thought for sure I’d have to come down after you. What the hell is wrong with you?”

Hayden let him rant and pace the deck in front of her. Fortunately, the sea swells were less than a foot. She stood there in her tank struggling to keep her balance and pay attention to his wrath. Nothing would be worse than ignoring him.

“Cappy,” Hayden said tentatively at the first break in his tirade.

“Don’t. Shut up and listen. I had to haul one dead diver up. I don’t want to make it two.” His hands tugged spasmodically at the hem of his t-shirt. “That’s too much in a lifetime. You had no right to ignore me, you had no right…”

Hayden grabbed his shoulder. “Cappy, there’s a dead guy down there. In the wheelhouse. Under the window.”

Cappy’s face sobered immediately. After a shocked pause, he said, “In the wheelhouse? You sure he’s dead? I’ll go down...”

“Cappy, he’s dead. I’m sure. Call the Coast Guard I guess, or maybe the marine patrol. There’s no point in going down after him, it’s too late. He’s tangled in anchor line. He’s not wearing gear. There’s bloating, and...”

Hayden’s voice trailed off. She couldn’t bring herself to say that his skin was sloughing off and the fish had already eaten his eyeballs.