Devil's Harbor (24 page)

“You
bought
her?”

“On paper, I adopted her. But that's the lie. Money changed hands.”

Finn took a deep breath. Then he said, “You're out of your fucking mind.”

Linda tapped ash into her ashtray and looked at him defiantly. “Like I said, you can't understand. You're not a parent.”

He ground his teeth. “I don't need to have kids to know you're out of your mind. We've got a boat full of cocaine. Gangsters are trying to kill us. The cops are after me. Your own daughter has been
kidnapped,
for Christ's sake. You figure now's a good time to adopt a kid?”

“Lucy would understand. I mean, she will. This is what she'd want me to do. Anyway, it's too late now. We can't go back—you made sure of that.”

“You should've told me about this. After last night.”

“Why? You think last night meant something?”

Finn thought it had.

“It was make-believe, Finn. A smokescreen. I fucked you to block out everything else in my life for a few hours. To forget that Cutts has threatened to kill my sick daughter. To forget the crimes I've committed trying to save her life.”

She put out her cigarette and quickly lit another.

“And if you had any balls, you'd admit you did, too. You fucked me the way you did for the same reason you drink the way you do: to blank out that shadow you carry around with you everywhere, to take a break from yourself even for just a few hours. You wore the mask. The minute we get back, we both know you're going straight back to your wife.”

Finn didn't say anything to that.

“So, what, Lucy's got a sister now?” he said.

“She's always wanted one.”

Finn tapped a cigarette out of Linda's pack for himself. He was done talking.
Woman's fucking insane,
he thought. She was right about one thing, however: there was no going back.

*   *   *

By nightfall, the weather had worsened to the point where it was no longer possible to travel at fourteen knots without risking the boat. Finn slowed down reluctantly. They lost speed but at least the ship's motion wasn't unbearable.

Navidad became seasick and Linda was upset about it.
What did she expect?
thought Finn. It was almost certainly the first time the kid had been to sea. Linda took her below to put her to bed in one of the crew bunks.

Finn said to Linda, “Get some sleep, too. I'll take both shifts tonight.”

Linda didn't object.

Finn sat alone, listening to the wind strengthening almost to a whistle outside. He wedged himself between the stool and the bottom of the steering column—riding a nervous sea was like driving on shot springs down a corrugated dirt track, and it was easy to get thrown.

The worsening weather worried him. He figured that news of his blowing the boatyard narcotics operation sky-high would've reached the cartel bosses by now, and that worried him, too. If the Caballeros were as crazy as their reputation indicated, they'd be out looking for the
Pacific Belle
in go-fasts, storm or no storm. Finn leaned forward and set the
Belle
's radar to sound an alarm if it picked up anything coming toward them. Then he lit one of Linda's cigarettes and scrutinized the horizon. From the look of it, last night's storm had been just the undercard; the main event was coming, and it was packing more punch than the
Belle
could take.

He considered finding a haven and waiting out the storm. Of course, that would increase the chances of the Caballeros tracking them down (they owned this coast, and he had no doubt they had spotters all along it). Even worse, they would lose precious time and miss their rendezvous with Cutts, and then Lucy would die and it all would've been for nothing.

On the other hand, if they all drowned trying to make the rendezvous, Lucy would die anyway.

He went over to the chart table and scrutinized the Baja coast, looking for safe havens. They were about 150 miles east of Cabo. Once they got around the headland, the next bay that afforded any sort of protection was San Carlos, 190 miles north and almost a day's sail away, by which time the storm would be well and truly upon them.

Finn rubbed his chin and considered. Cabo was a big town—someone from the cartel was bound to spot them there. Either they put into Cabo and waited out the storm but risked another battle with the Caballeros, or they kept putting distance between the
Belle
and the cartel but risked being run down by the storm.

Finn was too experienced a mariner to underestimate the storm. He remembered his father's words about the world not caring, and he knew a storm could break the
Belle
to bits and send them all to the bottom of the sea. But of the two, Finn preferred the weather. At least it was indifferent to them, whereas the Caballeros wanted them dead.

Finn set a course for San Carlos, leaned back into the chair, and listened to the distant rumble of thunder.

 

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Finn stayed at the helm throughout the night. The sea got steadily worse. At Cabo he rounded the headland and bore northwest.

At first light on the morning of November 3, he turned on the electric kettle wedged into a corner next to the chart table, then went out onto the stern deck for some air.

A gust ripped the door out of his hand. The moment he fixed his eyes on the colossal black clouds bearing down on them out of the southwest, he realized he'd made a big mistake. Finn had spent most of his life at sea, and this was the biggest thunderhead he'd ever seen. The cross sea had built to the point where he could no longer distinguish the usual, south-moving swell from the wind-driven, north-moving surface water.

Navidad emerged from the cabin below. She was wearing Linda's green sweater with the sleeves rolled up, the wind whipping her hair across her face. She looked like a gust would carry her away.

Finn went over to her and clasped her hand to the railing. “Always hold on, you hear?” he shouted.

Right then, lightning flashed below the cloud bank and a moment later a great crack of thunder rumbled over them. Finn pointed at the roiling sea. Then he pointed at the orange life preserver by the door to the cabin.

“If you go into the water, I throw this to you. Understand? You hold on to it and it will save your life.
Comprende?
” He mimicked throwing the life preserver over the rail.

Navidad nodded. Finn smiled. That he'd made himself understood was gratifying.

Linda appeared from below deck. She was wearing jeans and her green slicker. She looked anxiously at the storm clouds.

“She shouldn't be up here,” said Finn, shouting over the howl of the wind.

Linda nodded and grabbed Navidad by the hand. The two of them disappeared into the cabin.

Finn made his way back into the wheelhouse, fighting the wind all the way. Inside, he heard a constant high-pitched sound, like a whistle. Thinking it was the kettle, he went over to deal with it, only to discover that it had switched itself off after reaching a boil. He looked around the wheelhouse and realized that the sound was coming from the navigation system.

He scrambled over to the screen and saw two green dots no more than three miles away, traveling fast from the direction of Cabo, directly at the
Belle
. He switched off the radar alarm he'd set and thought,
You have to hand it to the Caballeros: they've got balls.

He took the AR-15 from the locker where he'd stowed it and stuffed the spare clips into his pockets. Then he picked up the binoculars and peered out the window on the side he expected to see the boats. For the time being, all he could see was the wind-whipped, foaming sea. The boats were low and still under the horizon, but the radar was telling him that they were traveling fast. The storm, meanwhile, was also moving up fast. Here were his choices, starkly narrowed: the Knights of Christ or the wrath of God.

Finn pulled back on the throttle, slowing the boat. The door opened and wind punched through the cabin. Linda scrambled in and pulled the door shut behind her.

“Why we slowing down?” she said, holding fast to the edge of the table and wiping the hair out of her eyes.

He pointed at the radar screen. “We got company. Two of them. I want the storm to catch us first.”

He peered through the binoculars through the salt-streaked starboard window again. He could make out the boats now—two red hulls speeding off the crests of waves, spending more time in the air than on the surface. They were no more than a mile away.

Again he looked out the back windows—the dark, rain-filled cloud mass was maybe two miles behind them.

“Crazy fuckers,” he said.

*   *   *

Two minutes later, the boats were within range, careening at them out of the east. He heard a faint popping sound, like corn popping in another room, and realized that they'd opened fire. The boats came flying off the crest of a wave and suddenly they were right alongside the
Belle
's starboard bow, two long, sleek, fiberglass hulls. It was ludicrous to come out in a sea like this in boats as flimsy as that, thought Finn. He was sitting in forty feet of rugged steel and didn't feel safe; what chance did they have in hulls built to be as light as possible?

One of the go-fasts went around the
Belle
's stern, the whine of her inboards just discernible over the cry of the wind, while the other shot ahead, then looped back into the sea and bore down on her. Finn peered through the binoculars and saw a man leaning a weapon atop the go-fast's windshield. He heard the metallic hammering of bullets ricocheting off of the
Belle
's thick steel hull.

“Get your head down,” he shouted. Linda dropped below the level of the windows. Finn stayed upright. He needed to be able to see.

The storm was much closer, but still not close enough. He looked to his right and saw the second boat running alongside them, a few feet off their starboard side, the gunman not shooting. He was fumbling with something with both hands. Finn's stomach lurched into his throat.

“Grenade!” he shouted.

He turned the wheel full-tilt to starboard, and the
Belle
leaned heavily into the turn. The lean gave the gunman on the first boat a line of sight onto the
Belle
's deck, and bullets started hammering off the superstructure, throwing sparks. Finn ignored them and looked back at the second boat in time to see the grenade come over the rail and land on the foredeck, no more than ten feet from the wheelhouse.

His heart in his throat, he watched it roll down the deck's steep lean and miraculously disappear through a scupper. He didn't see or hear an explosion, which meant it was underwater by the time it detonated, and the density of the water would've slowed the velocity of its shrapnel. The guy hadn't cooked it off long enough before flinging it at them. Finn released his breath. He knew it was a lucky break.

He kept the
Belle
in her tight turn. The sea was on her beam now—the worst place it could be—and the boat rolled so severely that he had to grip the wheel to stop himself from falling. Still he kept the wheel on full lock, straightening only when she had turned 180 degrees and was heading the way she had come. In other words, straight into the eye of the storm.

The two gunboats circled the
Belle,
firing round after round, concentrating their fire on the wheelhouse. They got lucky with one volley and shattered one of the starboard windows, flinging glass all over the floor, the bullets ricocheting off the ceiling. Wind and rain came raging through the cabin, stinging Finn's face. He was literally wedged into the high chair now, his legs braced against the footrest, his hands clasped to the wheel. He looked over at Linda—she was holding on to the edge of the chart table for dear life.

“Take the wheel,” he shouted.

She looked up at him, nodded, her mouth open, and felt her way over to him. They swapped places.

“Head straight into that,” he shouted, pointing at the black wall of cloud ahead before bolting for the door. The gale almost knocked him flat the moment he opened it. Legs spread wide, leaning forward into the wind, he made his way over to the port rail, got down on his knees, rested the AR-15 on it, and started firing in the general direction of the go-fast, just letting it rip in full automatic mode. He wasn't hitting anything and he knew it: the gun wasn't known for its accuracy on firm ground and he was firing from a heaving, rolling platform at another through fierce wind. The only upside was that it was the same for them. He emptied an entire clip. While he was reaching for another, he kept his eyes on the two gunboats. One pulled ahead and disappeared from sight. A moment later, he heard a clang and saw another grenade rolling along the deck toward him. His heart banged like a kettle drum. He dived for cover behind the elevated fish-hold hatch.

The explosion was tremendous—Finn worried that his eardrums had burst. Something sharp cut his cheek and he thought he'd caught some shrapnel. Only when he opened his eyes did he realize that it was glass from the wheelhouse rear window, knocked out by the shockwave. He checked himself: apart from the cut on his cheek, he was unscathed. The
Belle
's solid construction had saved him—the shrapnel hadn't made it through the raised steel sides of the fish-hold hatch. He got to his feet and looked over the starboard rail at one of the go-fasts—the guy in the passenger seat was working the pin out of a third grenade.

Finn set the barrel of the AR-15 on the rail, tilted it down to compensate for the
Belle
's upward heave, peered down the sight, and pulled the trigger, firing at least twenty rounds. He stopped and looked over the go-fast. He hadn't hit a damn thing.

But he
had
made the two men in the boat duck for cover. The one handling the grenades was crouched down in an awkward position, his elbows tight against his ribs. He pulled the pin and held the grenade for a second, cooking it off. Then both boats hit a big wave. The impact was bigger for the lightweight go-fast. It knocked the grenade from the man's hand. Finn watched him scramble on the floor between the boat's bucket seats.
Too late,
he thought. He ducked his head beneath the rail. The blast was tremendous. He popped his head up over the rail again. The go-fast's hull was careening ahead with no one at the helm, its windshield gone and its fiberglass superstructure blasted to pieces. The hull kept going till it hit an oncoming wave, pitchpoled, and came to a rest upside down, propeller shafts poking up, blades spinning to a stop. Finn scanned back over its track and saw with savage pleasure a man's torso being tossed about on the stormy sea, the foam around it crimson.