Always Ready (19 page)

Caddie stood beside him as they watched the
Wintergreen
’s workboat approach the rocky islet through the turbulent waves. When Tilley’s boat was within hailing range, she saw the boat stand to. The coastguardsmen were visible on deck, all wearing foul-weather gear. The men on the island waved to them.

“What on earth?” Raven lowered his binoculars for an instant and then looked back through the instrument.

Lindsey was at the radio desk when Tilley’s voice came over the staticky airwaves. “
Wintergreen,
this is
Wintergreen 1.
Vessel in distress is declining assistance. Request orders from the OOD.”

Raven strode to Lindsey’s side and spoke into the radio. “It’s too dangerous to leave them out there in this weather. Take them off the island.”

“Sir, they’ve indicated they don’t want our help. Request permission to return to the ship. Over.”

“Negative. Get those fools out of there.”

Lindsey flashed a glance at Caddie, cringing slightly as though she was glad she didn’t have to take the orders Raven was giving. If civilians declined assistance, the Coast Guard generally left them to their own devices—unless lives were in danger. Captain Raven must believe the men on the little heap of rock would likely not survive the long night there.

With the frigid rain and buffeting winds, Caddie had to agree. When the tide turned and rose again, that boat, staved up as it was, might float off and sink. Then what would happen to the men? They might be swept off the rocks if the wind and high seas didn’t abate.

Captain Raven issued curt orders to the other men on the bridge to keep the buoy tender as steady as possible in its location. To Tilley he relayed a request for the registration number of the stranded boat.

Their momentum and the current had brought the buoy tender closer to the wreck. As the captain gave instructions to move it back, Caddie again studied the island with the aid of binoculars.

She caught her breath. The damaged vessel had the same lines and colors as the one she and Aven had seen the Waller brothers working on at Anton Larsen Bay. Not only that, one of the men on shore had the same hulking shape as Spruce Waller. “Sir?”

“Yes, Lyle?”

“That boat, sir. The one on the rocks.”

“What about it?”

“I. . .think I’ve seen it before, sir.”

Thirteen

“I can’t be sure from this distance,” Caddie said, staring through her binoculars at the boat on the rocks. “But when we get the number. . .”

“Where did you see it before?” Captain Raven asked.

“Moored in Anton Larsen Bay, getting a paint job.” Quickly she told him about her expedition with Aven and the deputy U.S. marshal’s quest for the Waller brothers.

Raven’s eyes narrowed. To Lindsey, he snapped, “Get the registration number from Bo’sun Tilley
now.
”

He resumed his vigil with his binoculars until Lindsey called to him a few minutes later. “Captain, the name on the hull is
Miss Faye IX
, and the registration number is not currently assigned to any registered boat.”

“Check it against the boat registered to Clay Waller of Larsen Bay.”

A few moments later, Lindsey said, “Only one digit is different, sir.”

“I should have sent more men on this detail.” Raven turned to Caddie. “If you were closer, could you swear it was the same boat?”

“I think so, sir.”

“And the same men?”

She gulped. “Maybe. I only saw them from a distance and in pictures.” Her concern lightened as she realized she had the deciding evidence in her possession. “Sir, I have the photoson my camera’s digital card in my cabin.”

“Get it.”

Five minutes later, she puffed back up the final ladder to the bridge. Captain Raven was again consulting with Tilley via radio as rain sheeted off the windows.

Caddie approached him with the digital card, and he waved her toward the communications desk. She held it out to her friend, and Lindsey took the little square card and popped it into a slot on the computer console.

“We can’t let him see the ones you took of me.” The tension in Lindsey’s voice prompted Caddie to swing around so that her body blocked Raven’s view of the computer screen until Lindsey had located and enlarged the best photo of Spruce Waller standing beside his brother’s boat with a paintbrush in his hand.

She turned to Raven. “This is the man I told you about, Captain. He’s Spruce Waller, the one who started the fight on the
Molly K
last June that led to the boat’s being impounded. This other man, I’m told, is his brother, Clay.” She pointed to the second man in the photo.

“He’s the one who owns that boat out there?”

“Yes, sir. If it’s truly the same boat. There’s a better picture of the boat they were working on that day.” She asked Lindsey, “Could you please bring up the picture before this one? I didn’t zoom in quite so much, and the lines of the boat are clearer. You can also see where they’ve primed over the boat’s name.”

Raven studied several of Caddie’s digital photos then straightened and went back to the window, staring out and scowling.

“Sir, Boatswain Tilley is calling in again,” Lindsey said.

The captain again went to her desk.

“I’ve told the crew of the craft in distress to prepare for boarding,” Tilley said. “They’re still objecting.”

“Approach with caution,” Raven replied. “We believe some of those aboard could be dangerous.”

“Captain, there looks to be only three of them.”

“Watch yourself, Bo’sun.”

“Affirmative.”

Tilley’s workboat now hovered only yards from the beached cabin cruiser, bobbing on the waves.

“Will they be able to land and remove the crew?” one of the petty officers asked the captain.

Raven rubbed his forehead and gritted his teeth. “That remains to be seen.”

The fading light obscured the details of Tilley’s maneuvers, but a few minutes later a seaman called in.

“
Wintergreen,
this is
Wintergreen 1
. Request additional personnel and equipment.”

Raven’s gaze bored into Caddie’s. “Lyle, I’m calling for a law enforcement cutter, but we can’t wait for them to get here. Take six men in the Zodiac. We’ll issue sidearms.”

“Aye, aye, sir.”

As she dashed for the hatch, she heard him say into the radio, “
Wintergreen 1,
we have
Wintergreen 2
en route to assist you. ETA fifteen minutes. What is your current status?”

❧

Aven relayed to Mark Phifer and five other men the orders Lieutenant Greer had given him. “We’ll get in close and get an assessment. Be prepared to launch our boat fast, depending on the situation.”

The men all agreed.

“Greer will sweep the island with the ship’s guns if needed, but we want to avoid casualties if at all possible. Unfortunately, the
Wintergreen
landed some men and got into a confrontation. Shots have been fired, and they couldn’t get their men off the island. Our priority is to get those men off safely. If we can catch the Waller brothers, too, that’s gravy.” He didn’t know which personnel were involved in the melee. He hoped Caddie was safe on her ship. Too bad it was raining and nearly full dark now. The conditions would make their mission more dangerous.

As they quickly worked to make sure their small surf boat was ready for their operation, a seaman ran onto the deck. “The skipper sent me down to tell you, so he doesn’t have to say it on the radio, in case the smugglers can hear.”

“What?” Aven stopped checking their equipment and peered at him. Rain ran off his hood onto the deck.

“The
Wintergreen
sent out a second boat. They havetwo landing parties ashore now. . .or will have soon. The captain felt those ashore needed relief immediately, so he didn’t wait for us. Greer says use extreme caution. We don’t want any friendly fire casualties.”

Aven set his jaw and looked ahead, where he could make out distant lights in the storm. “Tell the skipper we’re ready to launch anytime.”

The seaman ran toward the hatch.

Mark clapped him on the shoulder. “Quit worrying, Aven.”

“They should have stood off and waited for us.”

“Like he said, they thought it was necessary to go in.”

Aven sighed, wishing the
Milroy
could go faster. He put his radio close to his ear. He heard what he had dreaded to hear—Caddie’s voice from the smaller boat that had deployed from her ship. “This is the
Wintergreen 2
. . .”

❧

The Zodiac, with Caddie and six other crewmen in it, rushed toward the island and Tilley’s boat in the twilight. Tilley would have left at least one man on his boat, she knew. The rain still poured down in torrents, and the wind whipped up the waves. Caddie hoped they were not too late to prevent violence. She recalled Aven’s account of his past confrontation with Spruce Waller. Even though the burly fisherman knew backup was only minutes away last June, he’d attacked Aven and his men.

Where was Aven now? No doubt hundreds of miles away. She hoped his ship was docked somewhere in a safe haven for the night.

She kept their course as steady as possible, headed for the
Wintergreen 1
. As they approached, she heard Tilley radio the ship. He reported to the captain that his landing party had been fired on and were pinned down on the rocks. Captain Raven instructed the seaman in the workboat to stand offshore further and told Tilley to keep his head down and wait for assistance.

Caddie didn’t enter the radio chatter, not wanting to clutter the airwaves. She assumed the smugglers on the island could hear them. Raven’s orders to the seaman on the workboat meant he would back off to avoid drawing fire. If the smugglers had thought of hijacking Tilley’s boat, that would stymie them.

She instructed Gavin, who was at the helm of the Zodiac, to bring them in on the side of the workboat away from the shore. The seaman on the
Wintergreen 1
and two of the men in the Zodiac secured the smaller inflatable to the workboat so they could talk without using the radio.

“I’m going to land around the other side if I can,” Caddie told the seaman she recognized as Michaels. “Can you stand off a little farther so that you’re behind us and turn on your spotlights when we’re in position? Illuminate them for us. Shine those spots right in their eyes if you can.”

“I’ll do my best,” Michaels said. “But make sure you leave a guard with your boat. They shot at us when we arrived and took out a big window. Tilley told me to back off. I think they’ve got a shotgun. They might try to rush the Zodiac and get away in it.”

“That would be a foolish thing for them to do, but you’re right,” Caddie said. Desperate men took foolhardy action.

With the smaller Zodiac, Caddie and her party had the advantage of being able to land directly on the rocky island. She directed Gavin to take the craft around the islet to the side away from the damaged boat. Without running lights, they risked hitting an obstacle, but she felt it was critical to preserve as much surprise as possible. At the spot that appeared to have easiest access for a landing, Gavin nosed the Zodiac to shore.

In minutes, Caddie and five of her six seamen were ashore and climbing over the rocks toward the beached cabin cruiser. After some hesitation, she’d left Dee Morrison with the Zodiac and given her instructions to stand offshore until summoned in.

The islet was little more than a large pile of rocks in the bay, less than a hundred feet long at this stage of the tides, with a blinking buoy on the highest point. At high tide, it would appear to rest in the water. The jagged black rocks in the center hid the damaged boat from Caddie’s view, but she could see the stern lights of the
Wintergreen
’s workboat clearly.

She sent one of the young seamen, McQuillan, scrambling to the top of the rocks ahead of her. He jumped back down beside her, panting. “They’re holding the bo’sun and his men down behind the rocks on the left. Two-eight-oh degrees. I saw the bo’sun and at least one of his men. There are two of the civilians near their boat’s bow and one on board.”

Her heart thudded. “Did they see you?”

“I think so.”

Caddie nodded and prayed silently for wisdom and safety. The renegades already knew she and her crew were coming.

“What now?” Seaman Torres asked.

“They may not realize how many of us there are,” Caddie said. “Three of the
Wintergreen 1
’s crew are ashore. So far as we know, there are three hostile civilians. They may all have small arms.”

“Okay,” Torres said. “How are we going to do this?”