The record keeper a murp.., p.4
The Record Keeper (A Murphy Shepherd Novel), page 4
Bones spoke softly. “Box.”
When the sound of the “Bo-” exited Bones’s mouth, I pressed the trigger as he said “x,” felt the recoil, and heard the suppressed percussion. Then, 3.15 seconds later, the windshield shattered and the captain disappeared from my field of view.
T-minus four and counting.
In the event of an oncoming obstruction, the ship’s autopilot safety protocols would engage at eight hundred yards. Half a mile. It would act much like a car with adaptive cruise control. And at 6.5 knots, or eleven feet per second, that gave us exactly four minutes to get aboard that boat before the alarm sounded and she slammed on the brakes, bringing her to a halt before impact. Now, these autopilot approximations had been calculated using stationary obstacles. Something like a lighthouse or a beach or a bend in the river. But we needed more time. Four minutes wasn’t enough. So how would the autopilot react to a barge appearing out of nowhere at nine o’clock on its port side, giving the 262-foot vessel a hundred meters at most to stop?
We weren’t exactly sure but had to assume the difference would benefit us and give us more time to board and offload without detection.
Bones had told the owner of the tugboat to watch for my signal—the appearance of fire out the end of my barrel. From that second, Sonshine floated exactly a mile away traveling at 6.5 knots. The tugboat captain would then have to wait patiently as the luxury yacht crossed the mile to his bowline in approximately eight minutes. Given that the barge was stationary, the barge captain said it would take him about ten seconds to engage all engines fully and create momentum and, hence, forward movement. So he and Bones agreed to set a seven-minutes-and-twenty-seconds countdown timer from the moment he saw fire emit from my barrel. When the timer hit zero, he’d engage all full, placing him thirty seconds, or about 330 feet, from the oncoming and unsuspecting Sonshine. Provided he could get himself across the 150-foot waterway, thereby blocking the Intracoastal—which he said would be no problem. In truth we didn’t care if he crossed it or not. We just needed him to act like he was, and we needed Sonshine’s computer to assume he was, which the safety protocol had been programmed to do.
In short, the presence of a two-hundred-foot barge crossing Sonshine’s centerline just shy of eight minutes from now was going to light up every dashboard light she possessed and create the diversion we needed. Which was complete pandemonium aboard that boat.
In the millisecond before I touched the trigger, I wondered how many boys and girls had been lifted from their lives and relegated to a life of hell by this sick miscreant.
After I felt the recoil, I waited three seconds and saw the glass explode and the captain disappear, tumbling backward. Then I ran for the Zodiac while Bones waved at the tugboat captain.
Countdown started.
Chapter 6
Colorado
I left the Eagle’s Nest and descended the mountain, then limped down the steps into my basement, sweat drying on my face. Every muscle in my body had tightened and I was tired. I had an hour until I needed to be ready. I came there thinking I was alone but I was not. The light in the cave was on and one of my three weapons safes was unlocked, door open. I leaned against the doorframe as Bones lifted an SBR—a short-barreled rifle—off the wall and slid it into a black carry case. Not the airline kind of hard case, but the soft, throw-it-over-your-shoulder or lay-it-in-the-back-of-a-boat-or-truck kind of case. Which told me a good bit. He followed it with a second rifle with a longer barrel—twenty inches.
He was wearing all-black BDU pants, boots, and no shirt—suggesting he was in the process of changing. We live in a relatively cold climate and in an environment where we work twenty-four-seven to respect the experiences of the girls in our care. Half-naked men can cause PTSD flashbacks, so we’re overly careful. We don’t walk around with our shirts off. Ever. Bones was midfifties but could pass for late twenties. Chiseled. No fat. Muscles on top of muscles. He took nothing for granted and had already returned down the mountain this morning before I set foot upon it.
The light shone on his back and lit the many scars spread across his skin. A few years before he’d found me in Jack’s troller, he’d been carrying a young girl to a helicopter when someone shot him in the back. The buckshot pellets produced fourteen holes, a collapsed lung, the loss of about half his blood, and six hours of surgery. The years since had produced several other holes and one long scar under his right rib cage where he’d encountered a knife in close quarters.
His back was a road map of rescue.
As he turned, I noticed a bandage covering the soft tissue below his left rib cage and a puffiness to his left eye. Surrounded by shadow. He pulled on a black T-shirt, then a black tactical vest that included level-three body armor. Something I’d not seen him wear in a while. He wore his Sig 220 in a thigh holster, and about a dozen magazines on his vest for both the AR rifle and .45 ACP pistol. Tucked into its own bag alongside the magazines hung a tourniquet. Finally, he carried a scandium Smith & Wesson 327 in an ankle holster. It had a two-inch barrel, held eight rounds, and was considered a last-resort weapon. He called it his “get off me” gun.
When I tapped the side of his vest, he winced slightly.
“Going hunting?”
Bones was loading magazines and sliding them into a backpack. He laughed easily. Like a man who’d come to terms with his life. “No rest for the weary.”
The way he said that told me this was not the first time he’d suited up during my convalescence. Making me wonder why he’d kept it from me.
“What’s up?”
He handed me his phone. The message described thirteen nine-to-twelve-year-old boys held in a boat off Georgia. Making landfall in Florida sometime tomorrow. The accompanying pictures confirmed what they looked like. Blond hair. Light complexion. Taken without a trace.
Some reminders hurt. And some wake you up.
I scrolled through. “Going alone?”
“Figured you’d had your fill for a while.”
Clarity started to set in. Bones had been doing double duty. “How many times?”
He laughed, zipped up the pack, and glanced at his phone. A pause. “Just because you took a vacation doesn’t mean the bad guys did, or”—he pointed at his phone—“that thing quit dinging.”
The recent wounds on his body convinced me the time for feeling sorry for myself had come to an abrupt end. “How long?”
A quick glance at his watch. “Thirty-seven minutes.”
I started grabbing gear.
He raised both eyebrows. “You strong enough?”
I inserted a magazine into my Sig, cycled the slide, and then press-checked it, physically confirming the presence of the round in the chamber with the tip of my index finger. More than half of all altercations involving a firearm occurred during low, altered, or failing light, so Bones had taught me long ago to confirm condition with my fingertips, allowing my eyes to roam elsewhere or, if needed, stay on target. I holstered the Sig. “No. But that’s never stopped you before.”
“Summer’s been through a lot.” The implication was clear. “You get hurt, and she’ll never forgive me.”
I nodded. “And thirteen ‘fresh’ boys housed in the belly of a luxury yacht hours from taking on wealthy clients won’t be guarded by a mall cop.”
He smiled. “They never are.”
I pointed at the bandage and the swollen eye. “You want to talk about it?”
“Couple of weeks ago. Carlsbad.”
“How come you didn’t tell me?”
The look on his face told me the answer was obvious.
“What happened?”
He held up his phone, showing me the picture. “I brought her home.”
Translation: “I did what was required.”
I continued, “You know anything about this boat?”
He considered this, then reached into the safe and handed me the M4—telling me our engagement would be close quarters and a scatter gun might be helpful. It also told me that when push came to shove we would not be choosing the subtle tactic. The Benelli M4 was battle-tested and considered by many, if not most, to be the shotgun you’d take into battle if you could only take one. When fully loaded, it held eight in the magazine plus one in the chamber and could wreak unparalleled havoc when wielded by someone who knew what they were doing. Loaded with buckshot, it could blow a door off its hinges, while the right slug could pass clean through an engine block. It was also designed to cycle and reload whether it was mounted firmly against your shoulder or not—which made it incredibly reliable.
Point being, it went boom when needed.
I gestured to the boxes. Slugs or buckshot? He handed me both. “So glad I asked.”
As we finished packing, he paused, stared inside the safe, then pointed at Jolene—my Bergara .300 Win mag. So named one night after she’d kept me company, and safe, in a Central American town. Jolene was well-worn and accurate well beyond two thousand yards. “Better bring her.”
Bringing Jolene meant we’d be sitting overwatch from a distance. Waiting for them to arrive and, if circumstances presented themselves, picking them off early, reducing their numbers and strength. Which told me they had a lot of both. Many times Jolene had been the great equalizer. Evening the odds. I shouldered both Jolene and the M4, turned toward the stairs, and paused.
Bones noticed my hesitation and glanced at the ceiling, which also served as the floor of the kitchen—where we heard shuffling. We both knew this moment was coming. He voiced it. “She deserves more than a phone call from the plane.”
“I know. It’s just . . . she’s not in the best place with me right now.”
Bones spoke as he passed me heading up the stairs. “It’s the life we live.”
“But convincing her is something—”
“Truth be told,” he said, interrupting me, “she probably understands that better than you.”
I began climbing the stairs, more aware than ever of the weight of my gear. “What makes you say that?”
He turned. “She’s the one waiting.”
Good point.
“But you ought to see someone else first.” He glanced at his watch. “Nine minutes.”
I found her on her bed, cutting pictures out of magazines. Pinning them to her corkboard. She spoke before she saw me. “You excited about my party?”
Then my clothing registered and her expression changed. The air let out of the balloon. I knelt next to her bed. Gunner jumped up, walked in a circle, and lay down next to her.
I set her hand in mine. As reality set in, her face betrayed the fact that the fear of “what if” was returning. Along with the fact that I’d miss her party. She shook her head and whispered one word. “Why?”
Words would not answer her heart, so I opened my phone and scrolled through all thirteen pics.
Each could have been her classmate. Her friend.
We sat there as she studied them. Expanding the screen with two fingers. After a minute, she returned my phone and sat quietly. Ellie had worn my Rolex since I had given it to her in the Keys. Despite the fact that it swallowed her wrist, she never took it off. Her constant reminder of me. And connection to me.
The clock was ticking. I had to go, so I stood and extended my hand. Palm out. She smiled, accepting my invitation, and I pulled her to me. Growing into the mirror image of her mom, she twirled, and we stepped silently to the choreographed dance we’d practiced, albeit without the Ed Sheeran song she’d selected. She moved seamlessly. A girl transforming before my eyes into a woman in bloom. My only wish was that Marie could be there to witness it. When the song ended in our minds, I held out my hand, fingers extended. Slowly, she did likewise. Touching her fingertips to mine. The watch dangling. I slipped my fingers inside hers, locking our hands, and asked, “Rain check?”
She curtsied, kissed me on the cheek, and whispered, “Rain check.”
After they’d found me in the cave and airlifted me to the hospital, Summer never left my side. Twenty-four-seven. Regardless of the diagnosis. Each of which was worse than the prior. When they brought me home, having been told I’d never wake up, she stayed by my side. Tended my wounds. Bathed me. Sang over me. Slept alongside me. Talked to me. Wrapped her leg around mine like a vine.
Through all of this she had no idea if I’d beat the infection. If I’d live. I lay there dying, pus seeping from the holes in me, while Summer poured out her life and fought for me when I could not. She rescued me. Gave me life. Hoped when I could not.
I descended the stairs knowing both the price she’d paid and the one I was about to ask her to pay.
I found her in the kitchen. Apron. Hair pulled up. Sweat on her top lip. A beautiful mess. She was standing over a pot of lentil soup. Something she’d mastered during my recovery. When I set down my gear, she didn’t turn. Didn’t look. Didn’t spin and twirl. There was no dance in her step. I was about to speak when she turned abruptly and pointed a long spoon at my face.
She’d been crying.
She pulled her shoulders back and lifted her chin while fighting another tear in the corner of her eye. “J . . .” She tried to speak but some unseen hand wrapped around her throat and choked off her air. She fought it back but it was too strong. The words wouldn’t come.
I stepped closer. “I won’t be long.”
Her eyes narrowed, she stuttered again, and then she gathered herself. Her anger rising. But not necessarily at me.
Summer hadn’t just cared for me. She wasn’t simply my nurse. She’d become my very lifeline. She’d drawn the line in the sand and dared death to cross it, screaming at the top of her lungs, “If you want him, it will be over my dead body!” She was then and is now my defender. The lone figure who stared defiantly into the hurricane and sheltered me. Summer’s soot-stained shield was grooved with scars meant for me.
I was caught between a love I’d never known before and a need I could not deny.
When she spoke, her lip was trembling and a roselike vein had popped out on her temple. “I’ll . . . be right here.” Then she turned and sank the spoon back in the soup, bracing herself against the countertop.
I placed my arm around her waist. She was trembling. Short breaths. Rapid pulse. After a moment, she faced me and tucked her arms inside the protection of mine. Her face flat against my chest. Ear to my heart. Listening. Her fear bubbling. We stood silently several seconds. When she spoke, her voice was raspy. “I know . . . this is the price I pay to love you. But . . .” She shook her head, speaking as much to my heart as my ears. “You are my one . . . and you outweigh the needs of all the rest.”
Oh, how I love this woman.
Finally, she placed my palm flat across her chest where her heart felt like it was about to explode. Then she looked up, her eyes finding mine. She spoke through calm resolve. “David Bishop . . . I need you to bring Murphy Shepherd home . . . because I can’t live without him.”
I thumbed away a tear, kissed her, and Gunner and I made for the door.
As I approached the truck, they were waiting on me. The remaining two musketeers. Clinging to each other. Angel spoke first. “Don’t make me come get you.” She pointed. “And don’t take any sh—I mean crap—from anybody either.”
Casey was the last to speak. She placed her hand over her heart, tapped it twice, and bowed slightly. The gesture was purposeful. A reminder. Without saying a word, she’d articulated the elephant in the room. “I am what’s at stake.” Meaning girls like her. “So go get me and bring me back, because I can’t rescue me . . . And I am not alone.”
A second later, Bones put the truck in drive, and the lights of Freetown disappeared in the rearview. As he drove, Bones held out his right hand. “You dropped this in the cave.”
In my hand he placed the worn silver coin he’d given me more than twenty years earlier. I’d been sitting alone at a café when Bones sat across from me and slid it across the table. I hadn’t known it at the time, but he’d been the one to free me from a giant of a man named Jack after I’d tried, somewhat successfully, to free the girls he’d captured and tied up on his boat. I held the coin between thumb and index finger, reading the inscription like braille.
The eleven words that had changed me forever.
From that moment, little about my life had been the same. And as Bones, Gunner, and I boarded the plane, I felt another change coming. I just had no idea that it would start in coastal Georgia—maybe the only part of the world that really felt like home.
Chapter 7
With the throttle slammed to full, the Zodiac skidded across the top of the water. One minute later, we crossed Sonshine’s wake and pulled up along her port side. While Bones jumped onto the stern with our bowline, I cut the engine. We’d made the decision not to paint our faces black, because what kid wants to trust a man who’s just scared him? Instead, we wore neck gaiters and skull cups pulled up and down to allow for the slits of our eyes. I told Gunner to stay, grabbed my gear, climbed up, and discovered that after a mile of travel and more than three seconds in the air, the bullet had done what I’d intended. Upon impact, the captain had made an involuntary backward somersault with what looked like a half gainer. The bullet-induced acrobatics carried him off the helm and three decks down, where the combination of the bullet and the gravity-induced collision with the deck rendered him no longer a threat. Bones slipped his radio from his belt, giving us access to their communication. Which was silent, meaning no one yet knew of the captain’s fall.
On the spur of the moment, and because I didn’t have one handy, I skipped the box and buried him in the river. Then we moved inside and downstairs.
The hair stood on the back of my neck as we descended into the bowels of another flesh ship. Something about the eerie silence reminded me that every man has a basement. Some lay dark. Unlit. Concealed. Others sprawl like airport runways for all the world to see. The difference is determined by whether he is hiding something or digging it up. Hammer or shovel says much about a man.
