Below the Surface (24 page)

But she didn't push her luck. Before she sat Manny down to tell him about Cindi and Luke's visit, she got him to promise he'd drive her and Cole to Marco later. She supposed she did make it sound a bit as if Cindi had come to introduce Luke to him. Now it was up to his Lucinda to play her part well at home.

Bree tried to take a nap but couldn't. She ended up pacing and looking at the clock. Three hours yet before she would meet Cole here for their dark-water dive.

She told herself that she had to get back to work on Monday. Clients understood a period of mourning, but her recent publicity had interested new clients. She had to get this place back on its feet. Back on its feet…she was dead on hers, yet she couldn't rest until she had answers. Manny had gone out on an emergency call, but her entire life seemed like an emergency since Daria had died.

The words—the reality—still staggered her. Daria…was…dead.

She leaned her shoulder against the double doors of the veranda and looked out over the harbor. Through the bare-boned forest of the masts and spars of moored sailboats, she could see the roof of Travers and Son Search and Salvage Shop. She'd love to look around in there, now that he and his staff were away. Had they taken that guy at the front desk, or was he still there to oversee things?

No matter, because she knew the back way to the upstairs, even where a key was hidden, if it was still in the same place after all these years. Since Sam seemed unwilling to change things, she'd bet it was. Sam, she was sure, had sent Ric to pilfer Daria's room, or else Ric had done it on his own. Turnabout was fair play. Besides, Sam didn't live there anymore, so she would only be trespassing in his shop—his shrine—not in his home.

Feeling bold, she locked up and walked the waterfront of Turtle Bay, just as she'd done yesterday with Manny in tow. This time she didn't even approach the front of the shop. Instead, she walked between the main building and the big boat-storage shed, as she and Ted had done years ago. A tall, wooden pole with a four-foot flat deck for an osprey nest, a nest rejected by the birds for years because it no longer had a clear view of the water, still stood there. Partway up the pole, in a chink, was a key to the third-floor attic entrance. The key had to be reached by climbing the outside stairs, which she did.

Yes. Sam really should have changed some things, taken down the
and Son
sign, moved this key. He should have admitted Ted's own decisions had put him in danger's way and have gone on with his life without hatred and revenge eating at him.

But as she leaned over the railing to reach for the key, she felt weak kneed. Could she go on without Daria? Admitting she was dead had been hell. And could she break and enter?

No, she told herself, she wasn't breaking in at all. She had a key, and it fitted quietly and perfectly in the keyhole. She had to do this.

The door creaked. Bree froze, but evidently no one heard her. These rooms were quite a climb from the office downstairs, even if Sam's employee was manning the desk there. She tiptoed in and closed the door behind her. The window slats were slightly open, casting thin bars of light across the floor. She jammed her finger under her nose to keep from sneezing. If Sam wanted to keep this intact, didn't he ever clean it?

This was the room that had once been Ted's, at least for several years after his mother left. Now it was a small museum, a long closed-up tomb. It reminded her of photos she'd seen of King Tut's tomb, the Egyptian boy king who had so many jumbled relics buried with him to take into the afterlife. Everything here was coated, not with centuries of desert sand, but with years of harbor dust.

Her wide eyes took in Ted's bed, desk and a chair with a pair of jeans thrown on it. An unlaced pair of dirty Keds. His catcher's mitt, tickets to Disney World, some favorite T-shirts tacked to boards—yes, she remembered that one from the Collier County Fair. Two big posters, one of them autographed, of football players from the Miami Dolphins. And everywhere, photos, photos, photos, ones Sam must have added.

She looked closer. In the early pictures of Ted, someone had been carefully cut out. His mother, of course. Bree hadn't known her, but she didn't think much of a woman who would leave her son, even if she did desert Sam Travers.

Awed, Bree looked further, past an array of Boy Scout badges, a lineup of bowling and Little League trophies. Then, tacked on a bulletin board, she saw some pictures she recalled. Like Sam's wife, Bree had been cut out of each one. She felt sick to her stomach.

Bree pressed her hands over her mouth, scratching her cheek with the key she still held in her hand. Did she now hold the key to who had killed Daria, either to make her suffer Daria's loss or because he thought he was killing Bree? He'd admitted yesterday they looked so much alike. But then why had Sam offered to buy her out? Why had he offered his barge to help search for Daria? It wasn't that he wanted to be there to see her pain, because he didn't arrive at the barge the day they had found Daria until they had discovered her body. Some things seemed to fit, but other facts didn't.

Ted's old stereo set was here, with its big boom box speakers. But it remained a boy's room. There was nothing of his days as a marine, nothing of his death—until she went into the next room, that had once been Sam's.

Bree gasped and jerked so hard she hit her knee on a chair. A life-size mannequin was arrayed in full marine gear, Ted's dress uniform, beret to boots. Its limbs had been bent into a near salute.

And on the opposite wall, a flag she recalled Ted had brought home with him just before he'd gone to Iraq.
Semper Fi,
it read, then in Ted's handwriting under it,
Always Faithful.

Bree sucked in another big breath as she caught sight of something in the dull, dusty mirror behind her. She swung around. It was a picture of her and Daria. Written across Bree's face, in Sam's writing, was
Never Faithful.

She started to cry. She couldn't help it. Sam hated her that much. Whether he felt she had deserted Ted, as his wife had deserted him, didn't even matter now. He'd been eaten up by revenge.

Sam had wanted to make Bree suffer, and he'd succeeded. He must have killed her sister, either by design or mistake. There was no reason to search this room for some other kind of proof. The room itself was proof enough. Somehow, she was certain she'd find that one of Sam's detonator caps had blown a hole in the very heart of
Mermaids II
—and her own heart. Did he think the bomb would bring him justice for the bomb that had killed Ted?

But perhaps she could find what sort of detonator caps they used now, then match whatever they found diving to that. Sam used to keep his explosives separate from everything else that was in his big storage room downstairs. There had always been a room on the second floor she and Ted were not to enter, which Ted jokingly called the “boom room.”

She tiptoed along the tiny attic hall past the bathroom and opened the door to the stairs. She could hear the muted voice of a man but couldn't tell what he was saying. So Sam's front office man was here. No problem, because she wasn't going onto the first floor and if he kept talking, she could tell exactly how distant he was.

The stairs to the second floor creaked, so she walked down the edges of the cracked plastic treads. But she was only partway down when a voice came much closer than the other. She froze, pressing herself to the shadows on the wall as someone walked below into the very room she'd been going to enter.

Ric! It was Ric. Why wasn't he in Sarasota? Had Sam come back, too?

He was on his cell phone, talking to someone. Thank God he didn't glance up the flight of stairs when he walked past.

“Yeah, I'm on-site, getting more blasting caps and primacord. That bridge is one mean bastard, but these babies will work great if I just get them calibrated right.”

He must be talking to Sam. They hadn't taken enough demolition material, and Ric had to come back for more.

“Yeah, a detonator, too, don't worry.”

Should she go back upstairs or might he hear her? He was making some noise in there and, of course, his own voice or Sam's might cover any sound she made. Slowly, carefully, she started to go back up the stairs.

“Okay, see you later with everything you need. And remember that little raise you promised this time.”

Sam could be bribing Ric for his silence on Daria's killing! Or for doing his dirty work, like trying to scare her away from solving Daria's death. If she testified to what she'd just overheard, would it be admissible in court? Probably not. But none of that mattered. She and Cole would find evidence underwater now, because they knew what to look for in the broken, blasted body of
Mermaids II.

T
hey dove at dusk. Boat traffic in the Marco Pass was lessening, though vessels went by from time to time with their running lights on, coming in from the gulf. The wind was gentle, the waves a light chop.

They'd walked half a block from where Manny had parked Bree's truck in a visitors' spot at a large, beachside condo community. He seemed more nervous than Bree and Cole as he rolled their tanks and gear along in a two-wheeled shopping cart.

They would each take two battery-run dive lights down with them, tethered lightly to their wrists to be sure they didn't get dropped or float away in the murky dark. Bree carried the penetration line, which they would lay down as they went in so they could follow it out. A pen line made for slower swimming, but they could surface where Manny was waiting and not make the mistake of ascending in the channel.

They had all been quiet, but Bree spoke as they neared the concrete seawall. “I still consider
Mermaids II
my property, and I intend to try to bring up any evidence of explosives we can find, so I've brought two lift bags.”

“You should have called your brother-in-law to check whether that would be tampering with evidence,” Cole said, “especially if we can get the police to open this as a murder case.”

“And let him know we're doing this? I've had enough of his lectures and taking over things he had no right to control. He should take care of Amelia, not worry about me.”

“But I can tell Amelia worries about you. She wants the two of you to be closer.”

“I know. I think we can be, but right now, I've got to do this. I used to think that Daria couldn't rest in peace until I could prove who hurt her, but I'm the one who can't rest until this is over.”

“I checked the fill in these tanks two times,” Manny told them, as he helped them gear up. “You should dive at dawn,” he muttered, half to himself. “Not many boats then neither.”

“By dawn,” Bree told him as she tightened the straps on her weight belt, “I hope to be knocking on the door of the Naples Police Department with proof of a murder.”

They eased into the night-dark water side by side, tethered to each other's weight belts by a ten-foot rope. That was the only separation they would allow themselves, they had vowed as they'd kissed for good luck. But now there was no more talking, only the sound of bubbles and the hiss of their breathing. They had not even brought slates to write on. Hand signals and a common purpose—and having been here before—that's what they were relying on.

Yet as they descended, Bree found the low vis suffocating, as if the solid walls of a coffin were closing in on them. Still, her eyesight was acute; the dive lights worked well, giving them about a four-feet radius of sight, and they both had compass watches to take them approximately to the spot where the dive boat lay. The day they'd stumbled on Daria and
Mermaids II,
neither of them had thought to take a compass reading.

This time they located the main body of the ship before the stern, which had been—Bree was sure now—blasted out. How strange it must have been for Ric to see what their explosives had done that day he'd helped to recover Daria's body. If she'd not been so distraught, Bree could have noted how they reacted. Cole had only spoken to them before the dive, while they were cleaning and loading their spearguns.

From the dark depths loomed the majority of the sunken boat, as if it were a ghost ship sailing straight toward them. But that was just a trick of the swift current, lit by their lights. They peered into the wheelhouse where they'd found Daria's body.

It struck Bree that the glass was still intact. Wouldn't a blast have shattered the windows? No, Sam or Ric would know to use whatever strength it took to blow a hole in the hull without creating debris that would float in as evidence. More than one person had told her Sam Travis was skilled at sinking an old boat or a bridge and leaving everything else around it amazingly intact.

Bree heard a boat's slow motor whisper past in the channel overhead. Her hearing was still sensitive from the lightning strike.

As they started away from the wheelhouse, her light caught something, and she turned back. Cole felt the tug on their rope and came back. It was only a grouper hovering near the wheelhouse, one that looked to be the size of their old pet Gertie from the Trade Wreck. She'd like to think that Gertie had come here to keep watch over the place Daria had died.

They swam lower, right along the bottom, still laying the pen line toward where they were certain they had spotted the piece of the boat before.

Yes! There it was! The grayish glint of metal, the curved aluminum handrail that pointed toward the broken stern. Bree was confident that piece of white metal should show up in their lights. But where was it? Could the shifting sand and silt here have buried it already?

Bree motioned to Cole that she was sure it must be here. He nodded and started to brush the bottom away with both hands. Ordinarily, that would lessen visibility, but it hardly mattered where they could only see four feet anyway.

Then, there it was, the piece of
Mermaids II
that had borne its name and now read,
MA D I.
They quickly uncovered more to see if the edges were jagged or pierced.

Yes! Something from outside the hull on the stern had blown the metal inward into a gaping hole the size of a watermelon. The first time she'd seen this, that section had been under sand and silt. She supposed, even if the police took a look at this, they could insist it was caused by a collision with the concrete seawall. No, surely they could tell it had been caused by what she'd overheard Ric call a blasting cap.

Chills raced through her. She blinked back tears to avoid fogging her mask. Somehow this hole had been made below the waterline. Perhaps the perpetrator had placed the device on their boat while it was docked, hoping the small, attached bomb would not be seen. Or perhaps the bomb had been placed when the boat was at sea by someone under the surface. Was another diver in the water besides her that day? Or had the explosive been attached after the boat either drifted or was towed away? If it was towed, why didn't Bree hear the motor or the craft doing the towing?

She looked at Cole, who nodded. He understood! Answers at last. Evidence which would lead straight to Sam Travers and his men. It all fit now, but first they had to retrieve this big piece of metal, get it up to the surface. It was so heavy that she might need both lift bags. Then she had to hope it didn't surface where a boat was going through the pass—

A barbed shaft from a speargun zinged off the metal inches from her hand. Cole's big body jerked; he pushed her away, yanking their tether taut. As he turned to follow, another stainless-steel spear raced past them in a blur of bubbles.

They'd been followed. By the killer? Now she knew who and why.

They could see no one, but someone could see them. Or were there two shooters down here, both Ric and Lance? Maybe the strong currents warped the speargun's trajectory.

They turned off the dive lights that made them targets. Utter blackness closed in like a trap. Keeping the ten-foot rope between them taut, Bree kept shifting her position. She was certain Cole was doing that, too, however much he kept putting slack in their tether.

Bree's breathing, her clicking regulator, her heartbeat and pounding pulse were like drums beating in her head. She couldn't so much as see her own bubbles now, let alone Cole.

Suddenly, someone gripped her upper arm and pushed her up, up.
Cole.
It must be Cole. Yes, they had to surface, then wait to see who else came up. But she hated to leave this evidence down here. It might disappear like her sea grass meadow. She reached down to touch the metal piece from her lost boat again before Cole yanked her away.

For one moment, she feared it wasn't Cole, but if she couldn't see him, she could sense him. To her surprise, he forced her fingers below his mask. His regulator and mouthpiece were gone, and air gushed out of his torn hose in a blast of bubbles.

A spear must have cut through his breathing gear. She took a big breath, then pulled her mouthpiece out and pressed it toward his lips. He pulled her closer as he evidently took a breath. They could buddy breathe, but that was difficult under the best of circumstances. They'd have to ascend fast. At least they weren't so far down that they'd get the bends. Two reasons now to get out fast.

But as Cole thrust her mouthpiece back at her, a big light blinded them. Now that their lights didn't make them targets, their attacker needed his.

Cole shoved her one way and went the other as a spear slashed between them. Their tether pulled loose or broke, or had Cole cut it? Someone came at her—not Cole—as she started away, struggling to get her bubbling mouthpiece back in her mouth.

Up. Up!
When in doubt, get out,
but there was no doubt about this.

The man grabbed at her, got a fin. She kicked at him, hit her ankle on his dive light, so it went off. Was she down here alone with the enemy? Cole was out of air, out of time.

Bree jackknifed and kicked the man with both feet, hitting him in the chest. She dumped her weight belt and kicked hard, clawing at the water, fighting for the surface. She came up closer to the gulf than she wanted, but not more than twenty yards from where Manny must be.

Cole. Where was Cole?

She spun around. Nothing. Without a light, how could she go back down? She had no idea where he could be now.

In a whoosh of white water, Cole surfaced, sucking in air.

She spit out her mouthpiece. “Cole! Here!”

“Get out! I lost him!”

Yes, Bree thought as they both swam toward the seawall and Manny came running toward them, but the killer had lost them, too.

Manny grabbed under her armpits and helped pull her out. She was gasping like a beached fish, but she tried to explain what had happened to him. “A diver down there—shot at us—speargun. Hit Cole's hose. Tried to buddy breathe, had to surface but—found a hole blasted in the hull—below waterline.”

Still sucking in huge breaths, Cole climbed out beside her, then staggered to his feet and stood to look out over the inky stretch of water. Bree scanned it, too. Nothing. No boats, no diver surfacing—nothing.

“I can't even spot bubbles in this dark,” Cole muttered.

“It's got to be the same guy who attacked me at the Gator Watering Hole. And the same one who blows holes in boats and bridges for Sam. At last, we know Daria's killer! I wonder if Ric could be the father of her child.”

Bree heard Manny grunt then swear under his breath. In all the chaos, she should have told her new partner about that, but now it would have to wait until later.

“Manny,” she said, noticing his bare feet and the pool of water where he stood, which could not have come from her or Cole, “you're soaking wet.”

“Fell in,” he said, his voice gruff. “
Caramba,
I think we all got in over our heads.”

Here came Bree, down the stairs. Manny had been expecting her.

After she had fed both men, Cole had fallen asleep on the sofa, where Manny heard him say he was going to spend another night. At first light, Bree and Cole were going to call the police to see who they could go talk to about retrieving the piece of bomb-blasted metal—if it was still there, Bree had said. They'd waited over an hour, pacing up and down the seawall, but no one had surfaced and they saw no boat nearby from which someone could have dived.

Manny insisted on eating at his desk downstairs while he got ready to close up and go home late. He'd called Juanita to tell her not to worry. She'd said that Lucinda wanted to bring her friend Luke over to meet them on Sunday and he was to keep his temper and be kind to the boy.

“What did you mean earlier by ‘we
all
got in over our heads'?” Bree asked him bluntly.

He'd been sitting at his desk, chin on his hands, staring into space. He guessed if Bree could turn Lucinda around, even a little, he owed her some of the truth, at least.

“And I'm sorry,” she said, sitting on the corner of the desk so she seemed to loom over him, “that I didn't tell you earlier that I'd found out Daria was pregnant.”

He cleared his throat. “I knew that.”

She gasped. “Since when? Who told you?”

“Not sure when. A month at least. Daria told me—more or less.”

Bree looked as if someone had slammed her in the gut.

“Overheard her take the call. From her doctor,” he went on. “She stepped into the back room 'cause you at your desk, I guess. She didn't know I was there, working on my knees on some stuff.
You're sure? You're sure I'm pregnant?
I hear her say.”

“But she never knew that you had overheard her secret.” Bree said that like a statement, not a question.

He sighed and shifted on his chair, suddenly aware it had been Daria's. “Nah, dropped a wrench.”

“So you said you'd keep her secret. Did you ask who the father was?”