Always Ready (18 page)

She rose and dressed in jeans and a wool sweater. If Jo-Lynn didn’t feel like going out, maybe Caddie could run some errands for her. She stuffed her cell phone into a deep pocket and grabbed her wallet.

Walking down the street toward the Phifers’ duplex, she found that her land legs were wobbly. She’d grown so accustomed to the rolling deck that the pavement seemed unpredictably stagnant.

She found Jo-Lynn eager to get out of the house.

“Mark’s got to work all day on the ship. I don’t suppose you’d drive me to the grocery store?”

“I’d love to,” Caddie replied, snatching the car keys from Jo-Lynn’s hand. “My cupboards are bare, and I’m craving fresh fruit.”

Jo-Lynn laughed as she reached for her windbreaker. “Hey, I’m the one who’s supposed to have cravings.”

They spent the day together, and Caddie declined another dinner invitation.

Back in her apartment, she faced an evening alone, determined to continue giving thanks to God. She settled down at the table with her laptop to work on the final draft of her magazine article about Lindsey’s career. After a half-hour’s work, she phoned Lindsey to check one last detail.

“Hey,” Lindsey said. “Remember I told you that I was going to call home this week?”

“Yes. Did you?”

“Uh-huh.”

“How did it go?” Caddie asked.

“Well. . .sort of up and down. You know, I hadn’t spoken to my parents for more than three years. Mom told me today that. . .that my dad left her. He’s been gone over a year.”

“Lindsey, I’m sorry.”

“Yeah. Well, Mom seemed. . .not happy about it, but almost relieved. It was so weird. I was speechless. And you know what? She wants me to come home at Christmas.”

“Are you going?”

“I don’t know yet,” Lindsey said. “But we talked for quite a while. I think we’ll keep on talking. And maybe. . . Well, we’ll see. Keep praying for me, okay?”

“Absolutely.”

Caddie got the information she needed for the article and went back to work, thanking God for Lindsey’s breakthrough with her mother. A knock on the door at eight thirty startled her. She rose and walked toward it, her heart racing. No one called this late.

“Caddie?”

Relief flooded her as she hastened to throw the dead bolt.

“Aven! I’d about decided I wouldn’t see you this trip.”

“I’m sorry. My original plan was to spend every possible second with you when your ship docked. God had other plans.”

They stood eyeing each other awkwardly for a long moment. Caddie at last stepped aside. “Would you like to come in for a few minutes?”

“If you don’t mind. I’ve missed you, and I’d like to tell you what I’ve been up to.”

“I’d like to hear it. Excuse me a minute, and I’ll put some coffee on. . .or would you rather have hot chocolate?”

“Chocolate sounds great.” Aven’s fatigue showed in a shopworn smile. “Seems like I’ve been running all week and haven’t had time to relax.”

“Jo-Lynn and Mark said you’ve been busy.”

He followed her into the tiny kitchen and leaned against the counter while she filled two mugs with water and heated them in the microwave.

“I don’t know how much you’ve heard, but a fellow from the U.S. Marshal’s office has been here on the island for several days. He came looking for Spruce Waller and Terry Herman.”

“Who’s Terry Herman?”

Aven rubbed the muscles on the back of his neck. “That’s right, you didn’t know about him. Let’s see, where should I start? Terry is one of the fishermen from the
Molly K.
”

“The boat you impounded back in June?”

“That’s right. See, the
Molly K
was auctioned by the marshal’s office a week or two ago.”

“Standard procedure.” Caddie opened a cupboard and took out the bag of marshmallows she’d bought that morning. Her hands shook slightly as she ripped it open. Mentally she berated herself. After telling herself for days that a permanent relationship with Aven, or the lack of one, would not shake her new serenity, she was trembling at his nearness.

“Yes, but the odd thing about the auction was Captain Andrews, the former owner, not only showed up for the sale. . .he bought the boat back.”

Aven apparently didn’t notice her jitters, for which Caddie was thankful. “Good for him.”

“Well, yes, I suppose so. Except the marshal’s office wants to know where he got the money. Forty-seven thousand in cash.”

“Cash?” That sounded odd, she had to admit.

“Yes, and they’d heard that the crew raised the money.”

“And this is bad?” She handed him his mug and a spoon.

“Well, yes. Because none of these guys has that kind of money. Or if they do, they shouldn’t. So when the deputy marshal—Ralph Eliot, his name is—came out here to talk to the crew who live in Kodiak, I went with him. The first man, Terry Herman, told us he had no proof, but he understood while he worked on the boat that Spruce Waller’s brother was running drugs in his boat.”

“Just like we thought.” Caddie smiled. “Now I’m getting the picture. That’s why you’ve been tied up the last few days. You’ve been out chasing the Waller brothers again.”

“That’s right.”

She led him into the living room and sat down on the sofa.

Aven sat in the chair across from her.

“So, did you catch them?”

Aven’s face drooped. “No. We went to Spruce’s apartment and his cabin. He wasn’t around. We asked his friends and neighbors, but nobody could tell us where he was. Or if they knew, they wouldn’t admit it. We took a small boat—borrowed one of the rescue boats—and went all the way to Larsen Bay to look up Clay Waller. And guess what?”

“He wasn’t home either.”

“Bingo. His wife said he was away. Again. Said he and his brother went out to scout some boats. They’re thinking of buying a fishing boat together, she said. But she had no idea where they went to look at these hypothetical boats.”

“Where do you think he is?”

“I don’t know, but if I were a betting man, I’d put my money on him and Spruce being somewhere together.”

Caddie sipped her cocoa. “They took Clay’s boat?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Jo-Lynn said something about stolen Alaskan art.”

Aven nodded. “Yeah. Terry Herman mentioned it. He’d heard a rumor that Clay Waller was somehow getting scrimshaw and other artworks on the black market and trading for cocaine. And we actually arrested a man—that is, Ralph Eliot did—who had some stolen artworks in his possession.”

Caddie listened avidly as Aven related to her how he’d gone with the deputy marshal to the souvenir shop. “The shop owner, Thomas Harper, refused to admit the stuff was stolen. But Eliot contacted the state police, and the goods Harper was packing to ship matched a list of things stolen from a shop that had just closed for the season.”

Caddie inhaled sharply. “Not in Homer?”

“No, here in Kodiak.”

“Oh. Well, a store in Homer was robbed just before we docked there last week. Or maybe it was an art gallery.”

“That doesn’t surprise me. This ring has apparently been hitting businesses in several towns. Most of them, as it happens, are near where men who worked on the
Molly K
live.”

“Do you think the whole crew is involved in this art and drug smuggling ring?”

“Not the whole crew. Terry Herman wasn’t, and he didn’t want to be. He was on the fringe of it and heard bits and pieces. He wasn’t going to tell us, but his wife bullied him into it. And I really don’t think Jason Andrews was involved. He had some violations of fishing regs, but his business seemed legitimate, and he was out there working hard at catching salmon. I don’t think he used the
Molly K
for smuggling. It’s Clay Waller who seems to be in the thick of it. And I think he’s gotten Spruce and some of his friends to do some work for him.”

“You mean. . .drug dealing?”

“I don’t think so. But possibly some of the thefts. Since we impounded Andrews’s boat and they lost their jobs,some of them are hard up. Clay may have promised them some quick money. If he had a potential buyer for high quality art, he needed to come up with a good supply in a hurry.”

“How will the state be able to get enough hard evidence to prosecute them?” she asked.

“They’re going to lean on Captain Andrews and see if they can get any more information out of him. We suspect now that he knew what the Wallers were up to and held it over Spruce’s head. He definitely has a grudge against Spruce for causing the trouble that lost him his boat.”

“So, if he threatened to turn Spruce in unless he gave him the money for the auction. . .”

“That’s my take.” Aven shrugged. “But Andrews is smart. I doubt he’ll spill it. He knows he’ll lose the boat again permanently if he does and maybe go to prison, too. If you ask me, the police will have to crack this case through the art theft angle. If they can catch the people stealing art and get them to give up their contacts, the whole ring may fall apart.”

Caddie lifted her mug and took another sip. “I guess the police have a better chance than we do of catching the boat owners bringing in drugs.”

His thoughtful brown eyes held her gaze. “Caddie?”

“Hmm?”

“I’ve missed you.”

She smiled. “I’ve missed you, too, and I admit I was wondering if I’d ever see you again.”

He raised his chin just a hair. “Mind if I come over there and sit with you?”

“Not a bit.”

He brought his mug of chocolate with him but slid his free arm around her as he sat down. “This is more like it. I wish I could say I’d never go away again, but I can’t do that.”

“I know. I can’t, either.”

He nodded. “Just so’s you know, if I don’t come see you for a while, it’s not because I don’t want to.”

She set her mug on the coffee table and snuggled into the warmth of his embrace.

❧

The
Wintergreen
plunged over the sea amid freezing rain and howling wind. Though it was only mid-October, Caddie was chilled to the bone. She tugged at the hood of her parka and pulled it in tight around her face. The cruel face of the Gulf of Alaska sneered at her today. With the seas so choppy, it would be next to impossible to inspect the buoys they’d set out to examine.

Over the loudspeaker came Boatswain Tilley’s grating voice. “All hands stand by for rescue duty. Repeat. . .”

Caddie’s radio burbled, and she nestled it close to her ear inside her hood. “Lyle speaking. Over.”

“We’ve spotted a small boat that appears to be in distress at oh-two-five degrees. Prepare your crew to man a workboat.”

“Affirmative.” She hurried across the deck to Jackson, knowing he wouldn’t hear her over the wind unless she got within a yard of him. “Let’s get ready to lower the workboat.”

As the
Wintergreen
approached the scene, she tried not to think about her last rescue mission in a small boat. All on the buoy deck could see that a thirty-foot motorboat had been thrown up on a rocky island that was mostly underwater at high tide. Buoys they were scheduled to refit clearly marked the safe channel between this treacherous shoal and the mainland, and one on the shore shone brightly. Despite the warnings, the boat had apparently wrecked in the unusually rough seas.

Since the
Wintergreen
was far too large to get close to the damaged vessel, the smaller workboat was pressed into service.

Tilley strode onto the buoy deck as Caddie and several sailors prepared to launch it. “You stay here, Lyle,” he shouted at her. “I’ll handle this operation myself.”

She opened her mouth and closed it again, but unvoiced questions teemed inside her. Did he think she couldn’t handle the boat in this rough water? Was it because she’d been injured last summer in the last major rescue operation she’d conducted? Or was he just spoiling for some action?

She oversaw the launching of the boat with Tilley and three others in it. As soon as they were well under way, she hurried under cover, out of the driving rain and up to the bridge.

Captain Raven was Officer of the Deck, and he greeted her with a nod.

Using high-powered binoculars, Caddie could clearly see the beleaguered cabin cruiser. The stern rose and fell with the waves, while the bow appeared to be driven up on the rocks. The craft was not about to float loose unless an unusually large wave lifted it, since the tide had begun its gradual receding.

Two men clambered on the rocks near the bow of the boat, apparently inspecting the damage to the hull, while a third stayed in it, waving and shouting to them.

“What will we do?” Caddie asked the captain. “Tow them in?”

“I think the boat’s too badly damaged for that. Looks to me like a big hole in the bow. Can’t be sure, but it doesn’t look seaworthy from here.” He squinted again into his binoculars. “We’ll be out of daylight in an hour. We’ll probably help them secure their boat and then take the men off the island. They can go back when the sea is calmer and salvage their boat.”