Wood's Wall (19 page)

He sat on a nearby park bench, trying to recover his pride, and watched the traffic. Another spasm shook his body, leaving him spent. He leaned over from exhaustion, when his phone beeped, signaling a new text message. He pulled it from his pocket and opened the message to see a picture of Mel and Jules staring at him. 

He got up and started walking, his fatigue replaced by rage.

***

Mac stood in front of the apartment door waiting. He could hear voices coming from inside and felt the presence of someone on the other side of the door staring through the peephole.

“You expecting anyone?” Mac heard a voice call out.

“I’m popular.”

Mac banged harder. The door opened, he pushed Jeff aside and entered the apartment. Trufante started to get up, but couldn’t find his legs. 

“Who are these guys?” Mac snapped.

“These are the dudes that found the package.” Trufante slurred.

Mac looked at them. “Should’a let it keep on going,” he muttered, shaking his head. 

He felt their eyes on him, standing in the small foyer, water puddling at his feet. Disgusted, he turned his gaze toward Trufante, ignoring the other men. “I’m gonna borrow a change of clothes, then we’re gonna figure out how to undo this mess you started.” He went to the bedroom, emerging minutes later dressed in a Bob Marley t-shirt and cargo shorts. 

“What’cha have in mind?” Trufante asked.

“I’ve got no idea. They’ve got Mel and Jules. Even if we called the Feds, it might be too late as trigger happy as our boy is.” He sat down at the table.

“If all they want is the box, couldn’t we just give it back?” Pete asked.

“Sure, then they shoot us, and the girls. That box is the only reason any of us are still breathing.”

“Shee-it,” Trufante said. “We gotta set ’em up. Classic con, man. “Down in the Bayou, you got to fend for yourself.””

Mac knew better, but had no other ideas. “Go ahead,” he said. 

“They know the stuff you swapped out is low grade, right? We need some of the good stuff. Give them a little sample, let’m test it. Then we bring ’em out in the open. Get the girls back.”

“Keep going.” A plan was forming in Mac’s head.

***

Mel’s phone vibrated on the stainless steel counter. “Looks like someone wants you,” Cesar said, picking up the phone. “One new email. Let’s see what’s up in this pretty lady’s life.” She watched him, feeling violated as he scanned through her phone. “Interesting. What do you know about lover boy and Mexico?” 

“What are you talking about? Let me see that.”

He tossed the phone to her. “I’m watching you.”

She read the email.
It has come to our attention that one Mac Travis had been in electronic communication with an unknown party in the province of Tabasco, Mexico. The language is cryptic, but it can be assumed he is communicating about some kind of antiquities
.
Please explain this, it affects our case
. She pressed the button for more details, revealing the history of the message. It was forwarded from the NSA to Patel. She read it again, hoping it would make sense. “What does this have to do with anything?”

“Maybe I can help.” Cesar tossed her the bag. “This was in his safe.” 

She opened it and took out the two gold pieces. They were ancient — two gold versions of a sea serpent, and she looked up, confused. 

“Unfortunately, I can tell from the look on your face that you don’t know anything about this. Very unfortunate.” He extended his hand for the pieces. “Looks like Mr. Mac Travis is in more trouble than he thought.” 

“What are you talking about?” Mel asked.

Cesar started, “My people, the Chontal Mayans are descendants from the Olmec, a civilization long before the Aztecs and Mayan cultures. Our people are pure, untainted by Spanish blood. Those gold pieces belong to our tribe.”

32

 Cesar was looking out the window at the yard. It had been deserted when they got here. Now it was starting to show activity, and that made him very nervous. Commercial fishing boats were pulling up to the dock to offload their catch. Wouldn’t be long before the place was crawling with fishermen. “We need to get out of here.”

“Where to?” Ibrahim asked.

“I’ve got an idea.” Cesar opened the door and pushed Jules out. “Walk to the truck. Do nothing to attract attention or I’ll put a bullet in your friend.” He pushed the gun barrel into the small of Mel’s back to prove his point, then turned to his henchman. 

The group walked to the SUV and Cesar settled into the driver’s seat, Jose rode shotgun, Ibrahim and the girls in back. He pulled out slowly onto the drive, and accelerated. They drove in silence, north on US1. He made a right at Publix and a left at the Sombrero Country Club. The turns started coming faster as he passed the Flamingo Key sign, checking his rearview mirror to make sure they weren’t being followed. 

Many houses were shuttered this time of year — a precaution against the coming hurricane season, their owners gone north for the summer. It was perfect. He pulled into the driveway of a large white stucco house with a garage — something that had increased the breadth of his search. Carports were common here, garages often converted to storerooms. He needed to keep the truck out of site.

“Wait here with them.” He went to the rear of the truck and opened the tonneau cover that hid and protected the contents. Crowbar in hand, he closed the cover and went to the side of the house. A few minutes later, the garage door opened and he pulled the truck in. A quick check of the street and he pushed the button to lower the door.

He went in first, followed by the girls and Jose. The house was like a tomb, the only opening the shutter he had jimmied open at the laundry room door. He went to the thermostat and turned on the AC, then checked the refrigerator, took out four Cokes, and handed them around. The group assembled in the living room. 

“I hope your boyfriend comes through for you.” He took Mel’s phone out and texted Mac to call when he was ready to make the exchange. “Make yourselves comfortable. We wait here until he calls.” He turned on the TV, sat back in the recliner, and sipped his Coke.

***

Mac looked out the window of Trufante’s apartment. The sky was a light grey with several dark spots where thunderheads were building. Early evening was an active time of day for the storms, nurtured by the heat of the day; the wind had picked up, maybe two to four foot seas. Nothing bad, just a little bumpy for a night dive. But he didn’t have a choice; he had to retrieve the package to make the trade. Although he didn’t have any intention of handing over the material, he needed the bait. 

Mac remained at the table; Pete sitting across from him. Trufante was entrenched on the couch. Jeff paced the room. Mac was laying out his plan, but obstacles arose at every turn. 

“The problem is I’ve got no air. I used the last tank of Nitrox setting it down there.” He needed the Nitrox mix to increase his bottom time. Regular air tanks would only allow a few minutes at depth. The enriched air allowed almost twice the bottom time. 

“How deep do you have to go?” Jeff asked.

“It’s eighty feet, and in the dark, it’s gonna take a while to find it.”

“We’ve got a couple of tanks at the house. Plain air, though,” Pete said.

“It’ll have to do. You got gear? I’d rather not go by my place.” Mac thought about the risks of the decreased bottom time using plain air. It was going to take him a while to find the stash at night. Visibility during the day ranged from twenty to over a hundred feet. He could usually see the shapes of the coral heads rising from the bottom as he descended. At night, he might have five feet of visibility. He would have to descend to the bottom, find the ledge, and work from there. A night time decompression stop to allow the nitrogen to dissipate from his blood was dangerous as well. In his current condition he wanted to get in and out as soon as possible.

“We can set you up.” Jeff said. 

“What about your boat? We need that too. Get Trufante ready, we gotta go.” Mac rose from the table, his legs shaky. 

***

Mac scanned the water. He would have been more comfortable on his boat at night, especially a night as dark as this. He had spotlights, controlled from the wheel house and radar. The small boat had only the required navigation lights. He had kept the green and red lights on the bow on, but disabled the white anchor light to help their night vision. The moon had not risen and the tide was out, making the navigable portion of the channel smaller. Conditions could not get any worse to navigate the narrow pass. They moved slowly through Sister’s Creek Channel. Jeff stood in the bow, shining a flashlight on the markers, which were otherwise invisible. 

“Watch that one.” Mac pointed to the red marker on their left. “Big rock right on the other side of it. Seen a bunch of tourists try and cut that corner too hard in a rush to get out there, and tear the lower units off. Don’t want to be another Captain Crunch.”

“How are you going to find the spot?” Pete asked.

Mac pulled out his cell phone. “Finally figured out a good use for this sucker.” He opened the GPS app, scrolled through a couple of screens, and selected the waypoint labeled “Rock.” The screen showed a compass needle pointing in the direction they needed to go, and Mac set the phone down on the dash in front of Pete. 

“Just follow that. Take her easy and go wide around Sombrero. This dark, you won’t see anything floating in the water.” Thankfully, lobster and stone crab were both out of season. Those times of year, the water would be littered with trap lines and buoys — instant death for a propellor.

Jeff came back from the bow as the boat passed the red blinking light, the last marker before open water. In the distance, they could see the intermittent flashing of the light on Sombrero Key, marking the reef five miles out.

33

The phone started to beep as it zeroed in on the waypoint. Mac looked around for something to mark the spot, but came up empty. He took the wheel from Pete and started circling, checking the depth finder as he went. Thoughts of Mel and Jules were pushed to the back of his mind as he focussed on the task at hand. The adrenaline of the coming dive replaced the fatigue. 

“This is hard enough in daylight. We need something to throw out and mark the spot.” 

Mac yelled at Trufante, “Wake up, sunshine. We need the chair cushion.” Mac had handed the wheel back to Pete, and was stripping line off a fishing rod using his six foot wingspan to measure it. When he got to 150 feet, he cut the line. There was little on the boat to work with and he had to improvise. The pocket of the BC yielded a five pound weight, which he tied to one end of the line. “How much weight did you have in there?” He asked. 

“There was only eight pounds of weight in there. You’re bigger than me. How are you going to get down?” Jeff asked. 

“It’s going to be hard to get down and stay there without the weight.” Usually a very efficient diver, his air supply lasted longer than the bottom time. But without the extra weight he would have to work harder and use more air. Running out of air was now added to his list of problems. 

Trufante was moving now, slamming into the gunwales, unable to get his body synced with the rhythm of the seas. “Got any beer? My buzz is fading fast.”

Pete nodded toward the cooler but Mac cut him off. “Need him sober.” 

He tied the seat cushion to the other end of the line and waited for the GPS alarm to indicate that they were over the waypoint. It beeped and he tossed the weight, hoping the line wouldn’t tangle as he hand-fed it. When he was done, the cushion bobbed on the waves, marking the spot.

“Stay with the cushion. If it moves - follow it.” Mac said as he suited up. “I’ll be on the other end.”

He was in the water, flashlight in hand. He finned for the cushion, grabbed the line, and descended. It was pitch dark on the way down and looked like a disco ball spinning in a dark room as the light beam reflected off particles suspended in the water. The visibility ended at the range of the flashlight — maybe ten feet. Not great, but for a night dive you got what you got. Without the extra weight he fought to descend. The bottom came into focus as the light illuminated the coral and fish. He disregarded the scenery, double checked his air and started the timer on his watch.