Wildfire (47 page)

"You mean the kid nurse?"

"Uh huh."

"You might want to see if she's still a viable option," Mike Takahara said as he cautiously examined the unmoving creature.

"What are you talking about?" Lightstone demanded. "We're the Fish and Wildlife Service, for Christ's sake. So I have to go find the guy another turtle. How hard can that be?"

"Probably a lot harder than you think. Unless I'm mistaken, that looks like a Cat Island turtle."

'Yeah, so?"

"Cat Island turtles are on the Endangered Species list. And as I recall, they're pretty near extinct."

Lightstone blinked, and then stared at the tech agent in disbelief.

"The Bahamians like to keep them in their wells for good luck," the tech agent explained. "And also as a source of food if things start getting a little tight, which I gather must have happened fairly frequently. Either that, or they're a lot better eating than anyone around here is willing to admit."

"Christ, I just signed a contract with this guy. How the hell am I going to get him another turtle like this if there aren't any?"

"Well, I suppose you could always try sneaking into some of the neighboring wells late at night," Takahara said thoughtfully. "But I wouldn't be surprised if these folks know every Cat Island turtle on the island by name and serial number. Probably not a good idea."

"So what can he do if I don't pay up?"

"Well, I suppose he could sue you, for a start."

"Over a
turtle?"

"A very
valuable
turtle," the tech agent corrected. "For which we clearly received valuable payment in kind, namely one more or less functional airplane. All things considered, he'd probably have a pretty decent case."

"You're a lot of help."

"Science can do only so much."

"Hey, that's right. What about our lab? You think if I sent them this one, the DNA people could make some more?"

"I don't know, Henry. If it was that easy, these little guys probably wouldn't be on the endangered list in the first place. But thanks for reminding me—I've got to check in with the lab anyway. I'll ask about the DNA, but I wouldn't get my hopes up if I were you."

"So what do I do with this one, put it back in the well?"

"No, I wouldn't recommend you do that, unless you're planning on giving it CPR first."

"You mean it's dead?" Lightstone stared down into the basket and then poked the immobile creature with his finger. It still didn't move.

"That would be my guess."

"Why the hell didn't he tell me that before we signed the deal?"

"Probably because he expected a member of the Fish and Wildlife Service to be able to tell a dead turtle from a live one," Mike Takahara suggested. "And besides, if you stop to think about it, that's also probably why he wanted a new one."

"Ah."

"Pig in a poke, turtle in a basket. Sounds like it's pretty much the same thing." The tech agent shrugged.

"Tell you what," Lightstone said as he gingerly lowered the basket into a nearby trash can, "you check in with the lab and I'll help Woeshack get everybody loaded up. Then we can figure out how to solve our turtle problem."

"You mean
your
turtle problem," Takahara corrected.

"Yeah, right."

Fifteen minutes later all six occupants were securely fastened in the Cessna: Woeshack and Stoner in the pilot and copilot seats, Paxton and Bobby LaGrange in the rear seats, and Justin LaGrange and Mo-Jo tucked in the rear storage area next to the mandatory inflatable life raft.

"Everybody got their life jackets on?" Lightstone asked, standing next to the Cessna's left rear door.

"You're acting pretty damned cheerful for somebody who's being left behind to fight off the bad guys and take care of my boat in the process," Bobby LaGrange said suspiciously.

"Hey, if I let you guys hang around here much longer, probably you'd end up being a grandpa and it would be my fault, 'cause the turtle died."

"What?"

"Never mind," Lightstone said, winking at Justin who had an embarrassed grin on his face. "I'll explain it all to you later."

After helping Bobby LaGrange to secure the door, Henry Lightstone walked around behind the plane to the open right rear door and slapped Larry Paxton on the shoulder.

"Mike and I are going to try to park ourselves somewhere off Devil's Point, see what we can stir up," Lightstone said. "You guys get clear, you ought to be able to find us on channel two."

Paxton nodded glumly.

"And don't forget to remind Woeshack about the floats on this thing before you land."

A perplexed expression appeared on Larry Paxton's face. He stuck his head out the door, looked down at the Cessna's ancient but still serviceable rubber tires, and then stared back up at his wild-card agent.

"Henry, what the hell are you talkin' about? Look for yourself. There ain't no floats on this plane."

"That's right." Lightstone smiled. "Have a nice flight."

In a series of very slow and deliberate motions, Larry Paxton worked his tall, lanky body out of the small plane. Then he turned around and stuck his head back into the rear cargo area.

"Mo-Jo," he said, "why don't you sit up here. It'll be a lot more comfortable for both you and Justin."

Once the Bahamian native had repositioned himself, Paxton shut and secured the door, and then slapped the side of the plane and said, "Woeshack, get your sorry pilot's ass out of here before Ah change my mind."

Nodding his head agreeably, the Eskimo special agent/pilot engaged the starter and throttle and then began to rev up the engine.

"You really think it's a good idea to trust the kid nurse with your arm
and
your will power?" Lightstone asked as he and Paxton backed away from the slowly taxiing airplane.

"No, Ah don't." The acting team leader shook his head. "But Ah don't think it's a good idea to trust Woeshack with mah ass, or you two with mah boat neither."

Chapter Twenty-nine

They remained anchored in the small protective cove for over an hour, alternately allowing the slow rocking of the boat to guide the motion of their oiled and sweaty bodies against each other, and then losing control again and again as they both sought to release the sexual tension they had purposefully allowed to build up all afternoon.

Finally, their urges temporarily sated and exhaustion nearly complete, they lay together side by side in the semidarkness, letting the warm air from the open, stainless steel ports flow over their naked bodies until Alfred Bloom suddenly blinked his eyes open.

"What time is it?" he whispered weakly.

Anne-Marie turned her head toward the starboard-mounted dressing table. "Seven-forty-six. I think it's about time we got going."

Bloom groaned loudly and started to sit up, but then changed his mind and dropped his head back onto the pillow.

"What's the matter, lover? Getting a little tired?" She giggled in that exotic, deep-throated voice that suddenly made Bloom want to reach for her again. But she easily evaded his grasp.

"Make up your mind, buddy-boy," she warned. "Do you have to be at that meeting or don't you?"

Bloom closed his eyes, sighed, and nodded his head slowly. "I have to be there."

"Tell you what," she said as she brought herself up onto her hands and knees, and then leaned over and placed a gentle kiss on his forehead, "since you're probably going to have to be awake for this meeting, and I'm not, why don't you catch a couple of winks while I take us in?"

Bloom started to protest, but she shifted her position and quickly silenced him with a much longer and far more passionate kiss. "It's okay," she said. "I promise I'll stay in the middle of the sound and take it nice and slow and easy."

"Like you do everything else?"

"No,
not
like I do everything else," she responded with a breathless laugh as she evaded his fondling hands again. "And besides, that way I can take a nap and be wide-awake when you get back."

"Wide-awake, huh?"

"And ready to go." She nodded, her lips forming that familiar mischievous smile as she sat up, allowing the dimmed cabin lights to reflect across the oily curves of her full breasts and illuminate the small matched pair of Scarlet Macaws that Bloom had found so enticing.

"You never did tell me how you got those," he reminded, gently running his forefinger in an oily circle around the intricately etched parrot tattoo on the inner curve of her right breast that was a mirror image of the one on her left.

"Later," she whispered, "but only if you're good."

"Okay." Bloom nodded, surrendering to the enticement of the soft mattress and the equally irresistible promise of more sex later. "You're on."

By the time he closed his eyes, he had completely forgotten about Special Agent Al Grynard and the scheduled meeting the following morning.

Alfred Bloom was already starting to drift away when she stepped into the master cabin head and turned on the shower. He never heard the woman he knew as Anne-Marie go back up the companionway, nor did he hear the clanking sound of the anchor being raised by the electric windlass.

He was snoring steadily when the muffled sound of the Yanmar starter turning over caused him to jerk half awake. But the pitch of the powerful marine diesel quickly evened out into a steady, bubbling rumble, and Bloom sank back directly into the dark abyss of a deep and needful sleep as the bow of the
Sea Amber
began to slice through the calm water once again.

Fifteen minutes later he was jarred awake by a violent wrenching motion that slammed his head into the teak bulkhead surrounding the sides of the berth.

His first conscious thought was that they had struck another boat.

He tried to move and was immediately aware that his head and arms hurt, and that the rumbling sounds of the marine diesel had changed to a high-pitched shrieking. Then, suddenly, the engine shut off and the boat rocked silently in the darkness.

He stumbled up the companionway ladder, only vaguely aware that he was completely naked.

"What happened?" he gasped as he saw her working quickly at the cockpit controls, checking gauges and shutting off switches. Her face was just barely illuminated by the dim lights on the control panel. He realized immediately that she'd been motoring with just the running lights on the bow and stern, to protect her night vision.

"I don't know," she replied, her voice sounding shaky but still controlled. "But I think whatever we hit is probably tangled up in the prop."

They both climbed down to the swim platform that encompassed the full expanse of the stern, and he held her arm as she used a gaff to probe around the skeg-hung rudder and propeller.

"Oh, shit," she said as she felt the hook catch on something.

"What is it?"

"A goddamned net," she muttered as she pulled a portion of what was clearly a large expanse of dark fish net to the surface.

"Can you get it loose?"

"I don't know, I'm trying," she grunted as she leaned outward and thrust her arm deeper into the dark water, trying to work the gaff back around the rudder to the propeller. After a few minutes of fruitless effort, they switched places and Bloom attempted to use his longer arms to some advantage.

They finally gave up when it was apparent that the net was tightly wrapped around the propeller shaft. Bloom set the gaff aside and they sat shoulder to shoulder on the swim platform.

"Aren't they supposed to have markers or lights on those damn things?" Bloom muttered as he stared out across the water at the still distant harbor lights.

"They're supposed to," she acknowledged, "but they didn't, or I would have seen them in the running lights."

Bloom was thinking about the faxed messages now, wondering for the first time why the ICER Committee had decided at the last minute to change the time of the meeting to nine o'clock in the evening, when everyone knew that Harold Tisbury was rarely able to stay awake past ten. And why FBI agent A1 Grynard would pick Rum Cay—of all places—for an early morning meeting, unless he knew for sure that Bloom would have the
Sea Amber
anchored somewhere nearby.

The possibility that Grynard knew about his planned overnight stay with his new companion at the Cutlass Bay Club —or worse, much worse, the ICER meeting at the Devil's Point villa—caused Bloom to shudder in spite of the warm weather.

He was also remembering, much too late now, that he hadn't tried to get word to Grynard through the ship-to-shore, as he'd intended, because he'd been distracted. Which meant it was all too possible that the FBI Agent might be waiting for him at the Hawk's Nest marina.

"I felt something hit the keel," she went on as they both stared out over the water, "and I tried to back her off, but it was too late, and then . . . aw, shit," she whispered in frustration.

"Not your fault," he said consolingly. "Storms probably tear them loose from their moorings. No way you could have seen it."

"I suppose, but that doesn't help you any."

"Why's that?"

"You've got a meeting to be at in about half an hour, remember?"

Bloom nodded. "That's all right, I'll still make it. We'll just have to go down there and pull it loose."

He felt her body stiffen.

"What's the matter? Does diving at night bother you?"

She shook her head. "No, not normally. But I—uh —just started my period, so . . ." She hesitated and looked out over the dark surface of the water again. ". . . I'm not sure it's a good idea."

"No, it's not," Bloom agreed as he got to his feet and then climbed back up into the cockpit. A few moments later he was back on the swim platform with a face plate, swim fins, a diving light, and a sheath knife in his hands.

"You sure you're going to be okay under there by yourself?" she asked hesitantly as he strapped the knife sheath around his waist and then sat on the edge of the platform and began to pull the swim fins onto his feet.

"I've been taking midnight swims off boats ever since I was a kid." He shrugged. "I'll be fine. Why, did you see any activity on the way in?"