The Inside Passage (Ted Higuera Series Book 1) (18 page)

On board the
Star of the
Northwest

Candace, in her
black cocktail dress and pearls, kicked off her heels and walked over to the
balcony. The night air felt cool against her skin, champagne and dancing had
raised her body temperature. Stepping outside, she breathed in the night.

The black water
swooshed by, leaving a rushing sound in its wake. Somewhere off to the right
she saw a few scattered lights from some tiny village on an island.

The isolation
out here wouldn’t be so different from living in Idaho,
she thought. How
far this luxurious cabin was from Mom and Dad’s little farm house though.

“What a night. I’m
bushed.” Harry pulled his tie loose and dropped his jacket on the overstuffed
chair. He really did remind her of Harrison Ford.

Was she doing the
right thing?

He’s a little
long in the tooth, honey
. Her father’s words hung in her mind.

Was twenty-two
years too much of a difference? He seems so young and vital now, but what about
twenty years from now.
I’ll be fifty-three, about his age, and he’ll be
seventy-five.
Seventy-five is old.
Will Dad be right? Will I
spent my middle years taking care of an old man, then, be alone in my golden
years?

Then there’s the
question of children. Harry had his kids. He wasn’t interested in starting a
new family. She never particularly wanted to have kids either, but to have that
possibility cut off?

She thought about
her sisters. Both of them were so tied-down, so restrained by their children.
Their entire lives were devoted to their kids; they had nothing of their own.
She saw them aging rapidly, but was it the kids or the hard life they led?

Whenever she went
home, her nieces and nephews piled on her like she was Santa Claus. She had to
admit that she loved it. They were so pure, so innocent.

Get a hold of
yourself, girl. Don’t even go there. You know it’s not going to happen.

“You going to stay
out there all night?” Harry leaned against the door frame.

Candace pulled
herself back to the present. She smiled, pulled back her hair and gulped in a
breath of the clean night air.
Tomorrow is the big day!

She stepped back
into the cabin and unzipped her dress, letting it fall to the floor. She knew
she looked good in her black silk bra and panties.

“Penny for your
thoughts.” Harry unbuttoned his shirt.

“A penny won’t do
it anymore, mister. Haven’t you ever heard of inflation?” Candace put her hands
on Harry’s chest. “I was just thinking that I couldn’t be happier. Nothing can
ruin this moment for us. . . “

****

Prince William Bay, Canada

The growl of the
engine and the whine of the propellers slowly receded. The gunfire never came.
Ted realized he had been holding his breath.

“He’s passing us
by.” Chris’ voice came from far way.

“Oh. . . My. . .
God,” Meagan whispered. “I thought they were going to machine gun us.”

“Well it’s over.”
Chris stripped off his jeans. “Let’s go back to bed.”

“Back to bed?” Meagan
voice rose. “How can you think of sleeping?” Now that the crisis was over, she
became more animated.

“Jesus, Meagan.”
Chris stifled a yawn. “It’s after four in the morning.”

“I’m too wired to
sleep.” Meagan sounded frantic. “I’m just saying that we should do something.”

“Why are we
whispering?” Ted sat on the edge of his bunk holding his head in his hands.
“Besides, what’s there to do?”

“I don’t know.” Meagan
paced the cabin floor. “Maybe call the police or something.”

“Hey,
chica
,
where I grew up, you don’t call the cops about nothin’.”

“What would we
tell them?” Chris’ eyes drooped and his words came out slurred. “Some boat came
steaming in here and unloaded? We don’t know that anything illegal happened.”

“You know it’s not
legit.” Meagan stomped to the ice chest for a bottle of water. “Why else would
they be unloading in the middle of the night?” She took a long sip. “If they
weren’t worried about anybody seeing them, they’d unload in daylight.”

The conversation
went on for the better part of an hour before Chris abruptly got up and climbed
into bed.

Thank God, the
man has some sense. Maybe now we can get a little sleep.

****

Ted was so wired
from the night’s activities that he couldn’t sleep. Uncharacteristically, he
was the first one up the next morning.

“Good mornin,’
Sunshine,” Ted said as Meagan came out of the head, dressed only in Chris’
T-shirt and panties. Her small, perky breasts bobbled when she walked.
Damn,
Ted thought, feeling himself start to stiffen,
why can’t she wear more
clothes around me?

“Morning, Ted. Is
the coffee ready?”

Ted grabbed a mug
from the teak rack and poured it three-quarters full. He lifted the heavy cover
to the ice chest and pulled up a carton of half and half. Half a packet of
Splenda and it was ready for Her Majesty. Oscar rubbed back and forth against
Ted as he tried to work, constantly getting in his way. Ted gently sat him on
the deck. Oscar jumped right back up to the counter. Ted sighed.

 Meagan sat on the
port settee, the over-sized T-shirt pulled up around her knees, as she cradled
the hot cup. “What do you think they were up to?”

“It looked like a
drug buy. It smelled like a drug buy.”

“Let’s go ashore.
I want to see what they were doing.”

“I don’t think
that’s a very good idea.” Ted rummaged around in the locker for a sauce pan. “I
think we should get out of here as fast as we can.” He pulled a cardboard
cylinder of oatmeal from the locker behind the stove.

“I wouldn’t worry
about it, bro.” Chris entered the main saloon, buckling his belt. “They’re long
gone. They weren’t up to any good, so they’re not going to stick around.
Especially when they know that we’re here in the bay.”

****

Chris was
pussy-whipped. That’s all that there was to it. Against Ted’s better advice,
Chris agreed to go ashore.

“What could it
hurt to have a quick look around?” Chris asked as Ted prepared the oatmeal.

After breakfast
they dressed and descended the swim steps to the rubber dinghy. Chris took his
position as captain and manned the small outboard motor.  Ted sat in the bow,
handling the painter.

Ted loved riding
in the dinghy because with its hard, fiberglass bottom it easily planed over
the water at full throttle. At twenty knots, they flew across the water. In a
few minutes they covered the same distance that had taken the fishing boat an
eternity.

Chris ran the
rubber boat up onto the sandy beach and Ted jumped out, bow line in hand and
pulled the dinghy further out of the water.

“Thank you,”
Meagan took Ted’s proffered hand.

Ted’s heart beat
increased as she gave his hand a squeeze and held on a little longer than
necessary.

“Let’s see if we
can find where they went.” Chris was eager to go charging off into the island
on this insane mission.

“I dunno, man,”
Ted replied. “You don’t want to mess with those
hombres
.”

“Like I said,
they’re long gone.”

“Look over here,”
Meagan shouted. “There’s tire tracks on the beach.”

“What are you,
Nancy Drew?” Ted asked.

Ted knelt on one
knee to examine the tracks. They ended under a makeshift tripod with a block
and tackle. “That wasn’t drugs, dude,” he said. “Drugs don’t weigh that much.
Those were heavy boxes.”

“What could they
have been smuggling in the middle of the night that was so heavy?” Chris rubbed
the back of his head.

“In the old days,
it might have been liquor,” Meagan offered. “My grandfather used to tell us
stories about rum running in these islands. But that was a long time ago.”

“If they were
smuggling computer technology,” Chris said, “I’d expect them to go the other
way. It’s against the law to sell certain kinds of computers to China, but they’d be loading them on the boat, not unloading them.”

“Maybe it was a
drop off point.” Ted pawed at the track marks with his foot. “Maybe they just
unloaded here, then loaded them unto a smaller boat and took them to the city.”

“Yeah, well, Mr.
Smarty.” Meagan shoved Ted’s shoulder. “We didn’t hear any other boats last
night.”

“They could’ve
trucked them over to the other side of the island to haul them off.”

“There’s no other
landing place on the island.” Chris’ eyes rolled up and to the right, a sure
sign that he was accessing his photographic memory. “Unless they’re flying them
out of here, they have to use this beach.”

The tracks in the
sand led to an old logging road that ran from the beach into the interior of
the island.

“Well, we’ll
probably never know what it was all about,” Meagan said.  “Let’s explore the
island as long as we’re here.”

Chris strapped on
his backpack and followed Meagan. Ted sighed and trailed behind. 

In moments the
forest surrounded them. A layer of pine needles on the road absorbed their footsteps.
Ted breathed in the sweet aroma of cedar mixed with salal berries. This
wilderness stuff was a whole new experience for him. An early morning chill
hung in the air. As they ascended the road, they entered a layer of fog. The
world disappeared in the mist. 

“Let’s go back to
the boat, dude.” Ted’s spider sense was going wild. “Ted doesn’t like this
fog.”

“No.” Meagan continued
on in front. “It’s really cool. Let’s climb to the top of the island. I’ll bet
we get above it, then we’ll have a great view.”

“You heard the
lady, bro.” Chris took a gulp of breath. “This road probably leads to the top
of the hill.”

He just doesn’t
want to look wimpy in front of his novia.

Walking in the fog
disoriented Ted. He lost all sense of direction as he put one foot in front of
the other on the old logging road. The further they went, the more the road
fell into a state of disrepair. Ted’s breath came harder as he went up the
hill.

“Look out!” Meagan
gasped, ducking.

“What was it?”
Chris ran up to her.

“I thought I heard
something.” She swept her golden hair back from her eyes.

“It was just a
bird; Miss ‘I’m braver than the boys.’” Ted mimicked a chicken flapping its
wings.

“You’re just
trying to cover up your own jittery nerves.” Meagan resumed the lead up the
hill.

William and Mary Island was roughly conical in shape with a peak six-hundred and fifty feet above sea
level. As they approached the top of the island, the fog melted away.

“Wow! Look at that
view,” Meagan said.

Below them lay a
sea of fog. Ted thought it looked like whipped cream, dotted here and there
with the top of a neighboring island. “It looks like you could walk across it,”
he said.

“Get down,” Chris
whispered. “There’s a truck.”

They dropped to
their knees behind a fallen log. In a clearing at the top of the hill sat an
old battered Ford F-350 four by four. Near the truck an abandoned-looking shack
and some run-down buildings looked like they might collapse at any minute.
Several tents pitched nearby showed that somebody was using the camp. There
wasn’t a sound to be heard.

“Let’s get outta
here, man,” Ted whispered.

William and Mary Island

A seagull made his
early morning call. A smaller bird, probably a robin, twittered in response.
The air smelled sweet but the fog hung heavy as Ahmad and his friends gathered
around a wooden crate in the clearing. Tall evergreen trees ringed Ahmad’s
world.

Ahmad watched the
blade of the curved dagger.
It’s like the fangs of a cobra
. With a quick
movement, Yasim slipped the blade under the lid of the box and pried it off.

“This, my
brothers, is new best friend.” Yasim tossed a rifle to Ahmad. “Get to know.
Learn to love. Take care of rifle and it take care of you.”

In the Taliban
training camp, Ahmad remembered, Jamal, their instructor, told Ahmad that he
got more pleasure from his AK-47 than he did from his wife.

“The Kalashnikov
AK-47,” Yasim continued, “has been used by more revolutionaries around world
than any other weapon.”

This rifle felt
different to Ahmad. Unlike the weapon with which he trained in Afghanistan, this one had a wooden stock and a pistol grip. He ran his hands over the
smooth wood. It had a sensuous feel to it.

“In butt stock of
rifle, you find cleaning kit. Clean weapons and let us get firing.”

Ahmad ejected the
magazine and pulled back the bolt to verify that there was no shell in the
chamber. His fingers remembered the drill, even if his mind didn’t. He removed
the rear cover and withdrew the bolt carrier. It took only moments to field
strip the piece. He scrubbed the heavy grease coating from the shiny metal
parts, lightly oiled them, then reassembled the weapon.

Loading the banana
clips took more time than stripping and cleaning the rifle. When his spare
clips were loaded, he thought back to Jamal’s training.

Insert
magazine.

Move selector
level to bottom position.

Pull back and
release the charging handle.

Aim low.

Squeeze the
trigger.

The rifle barked.
Chips flew from the tree across the clearing.

Ahmad smiled and
flipped the selector lever to the middle position, then pulled back the
charging handle again. He took careful aim and held down the trigger. The rifle
bellowed a burst of fire. The tree blew to pieces. Spent shell casings arched
through the air. The kick almost knocked him off balance.        

The other men
cheered.

“You are fast at
cleaning gun.” Yasim patted his back. “Congratulations.”

***

These were clearly
bad guys, smuggling something ashore in the middle of the night. Ted had seen
too much of this sort of thing in the
barrio
. They might be dangerous.
On the other hand, the camp was deserted. Were they far off?

“I want to see
what they’re up to,” Meagan whispered. She grabbed Ted’s arm as he turned back
toward the logging road.

“Hey,
chica
,
if the truck’s still here, that means those hombres are still around.” Ted’s
kept his voice down too.

“What’re we going
to tell the authorities?” Meagan’s head bobbed from side to side like a chicken
as she talked.  “That a bunch of foreign sounding guys unloaded some stuff in
the middle of the night? We should at least see what they were unloading.”

“Why don’t we just
go in and eat their porridge?” Ted tried to cover up the uneasiness he felt in
the pit of his stomach. “Maybe we could take a nap in their beds too. This one
looks juuuuust right.”

“Oh, cut it out.”
Meagan shoved Ted’s shoulder. “There’s no one around. I could go running
through the camp naked and no one would see.”

“I’m just saying.
. . “

“Wimpy, wimpy,
wimpy.”

“Okay, you two. Knock
it off.” Chris took charge. “Let’s sneak up there, but if we see or hear
anyone, we’re out of here.”

They crept up to
the truck. Ted listened intently for any signs of habitation. Nothing stirred.
A heavy silence hung in the air.

“Look inside the
shed.” Meagan gave Ted a shove from her position next to the truck’s big rear
tire.

Chris and Ted
exchanged a glance. They always seemed to be able to read each other’s thoughts.
Crouching down, Chris ran across the clearing to the wooden building with Ted
on his heels. Still no sound. It was late enough in the day that someone should
have been up. Chris poked his head around the open double door.

“Shit, there they
are. Those are the crates they unloaded.”

“This writing
looks like Arabic.” Ted ran his hand over the rough surface of one of the
smaller crates.

“Not this big
one,” Chris said. “This is French. I can’t understand it, but I know French
when I see it.”

“
Madre
de Dios
. It says ‘Exocet’.
You know what that is?”

“No.”

“It’s a missile,
dude. An anti-ship missile. I remember reading about them in history class. The
Argentines used them in the Falklands war. One of those babies will take out an
aircraft carrier from fifty miles out.”

“Let’s see what’s
in these other boxes.” Chris used his rigging knife to pry the lid off of one
of the smaller boxes.

“Jesus, Chris.”
Ted’s breathing rapidly accelerated. “Don’t mess with ‘em. They’ll notice.”

“Too late.” Chris
lifted the lid off of the crate. “They look like some kind of bazooka.”

“Shoulder launched
missiles.” Ted lifted the long, pipe-shaped weapon from the box. “This is what
the Sunnis and Shiites use to shoot down American helicopters. What’re these
guys up to?”

Chris took the
launcher from Ted and returned it to the crate. “Let’s get out of here.” Chris
lowered the lid onto the box.  

To their left and
down the hill Ted heard a gunshot, then a burst of automatic weapon fire.