LITMIR.BIZ

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nimbly grabbing and tearing off some of the twenty centimeters of rubber covering. The massive, looping cables from the floating, semisubmersible platform held the sub in place. It amazed him that things looked so clear on the monitor at the depth of almost 3,000 meters, although wisps of silt from the seabed stirred up as the submersible altered its position. As soon as the area was monitored again for radiation, the divers could start the salvage process. Grimes turned to the technician at the console.

      “What’s the radiation level down there?”

      The tech picked up the microphone and called the submersible.

      “So far almost negligible,” the dive leader replied. “We’ll know more once we cut into the second hull.”

      Grimes looked at his watch. If they continued this operation through the night, they should be able to get into the compartments soon. He glanced out through the window. There was perhaps an hour of daylight left, but the sky was tinctured with a reddish glow. Grimes smiled.

      Red sky by morning, sailor take warning. Red sky at night, sailor’s delight. Or so the old saying went. He hoped the calm weather they’d been blessed with the past few weeks would indeed hold.

      “Get the second dive team ready to go down in the bell,” Grimes said. “Tell them to plan to stay submerged. That way they won’t waste time decompressing each time.”

      The technician looked at him. “Is that wise, sir? We haven’t got much daylight left.”

      Grimes turned to stare at the man. “Need I remind you I don’t like to repeat myself?” He punctuated the question by removing the long, black leather sap he kept in his pocket, and placing the tip against the technician’s jawline. The cords in the man’s neck tightened.

      Grimes smiled.

      It was true, it would be dark soon, but at 3,000 meters below, what difference did that make? It was dark down there regardless, and the divers had to rely on artificial lighting. Grimes held the sap a moment longer, then let it drop. He said nothing more, but made a note to reprimand the salvage chief for placing such an idiot on the console. But that could wait, too. Everett would be expecting a full report when he came back to the island, but that wasn’t for two more days. Grimes, however, was anxious to get off this floating platform rig and back on shore. “And tell them to get my boat ready. I’m going in.”

      The technician nodded and picked up the phone.

      Good, Grimes thought. He knows he displeased me. Next time he’ll be on his toes, or else his jaw will be wired shut.

      Grimes left the control room and strolled around to the side of the platform, placing both hands on the metal safety railing and inhaling the fresh, salty air. The sun was an orange sphere, poised to descend into the ocean. It was a beautiful, awe-inspiring sight that never failed to please him. But something else caught his attention and broke the spell. A vessel was approaching, so close now that Grimes could see it was a luxury yacht. He turned and strode back into the control room.

      “Check the monitors, you moron,” he said. “I saw a ship out there.”

      The technician rolled his chair over to another section and nodded. “Yes, sir. Looks like a civilian yacht. A cabin cruiser, about fifty to sixty feet in length.”

      “Where the hell is that damn island police boat?”

      The technician studied the radar screen and shook his head. “Can’t place them, sir. Maybe they went to dinner.”

      Grimes swore under his breath. Those islanders were useless. What the hell was Everett paying them for? Still, at this point, the yacht situation might be better handled in-house. “Have a security team meet me by the launch immediately.”

      He turned and stormed out again, this time walking briskly down to the gangway that led to the lower section adjacent to one of the platform’s massive buoyancy tanks. By the time Grimes reached the stairs to the launching platform, a squad of five men, all wearing sidearms and carrying AK-47 rifles, had hastily assembled, standing at attention. Grimes gave them a quick, cursory inspection. All had on their crisp, blue uniforms—BDU blouses and cargo pants—and they wore baseball hats emblazoned with Everett Security.

      “We’ve got visitors,” Grimes said, pointing to the yacht, which was perhaps five hundred yards away and still advancing. “The island police are nowhere to be found. We’ve got to do it ourselves.”

      Vincent Tanner, the security team leader, nodded and ordered his men to board a twenty-five-foot skiff. Grimes accompanied him to the cabin and watched as they fired up the engine and embarked on an intercept course. When they were about a hundred yards away, Grimes gave the order for the men below to keep their weapons out of sight for the time being. Then he picked up the microphone and called out over the loudspeaker, “You’ve entered a restricted area. Come to a stop immediately.”

      The yacht, which had A Slice of Heaven in black script along its prow, signaled with a blast from its horn, and slowed. Grimes scanned the wheelhouse, which was enclosed on three sides by glass windows under a sloping canopy. A middle-aged white guy with a glass in his hand, wearing a colorful shirt and a white captain’s hat, stood next to a young Latino man at the yacht’s controls. A woman in a bikini stood nearby, her body taut and very tan. The yacht was dead in the water now and Tanner cut the skiff’s motor, letting them drift within shouting distance of the other vessel. The boat looked as if it could comfortably sleep at least four or five.

      The white guy in the wheelhouse pushed back the window on one side and stuck his head out. “What the hell’s all the yelling about?” His voice sounded thick.

      “This is a restricted area,” Grimes said. “You’ll have to leave immediately.”

      “Restricted?” The man was slurring his words now, his movements slightly exaggerated. “Says who? You don’t look like an official naval vessel to me. Besides, we’re not even inside the three-mile limits yet. Are we?” He turned to the man at the wheel, who shrugged and smiled.

      “Will you calm down, Harv?” the woman next to him said. She put her arm around the older man’s shoulders and squeezed as she turned her head and flashed a smile at Grimes. “Good old Harv is a really nice guy,” she called out. She was probably a little bit tipsy, too, but certainly less so than the man. “We didn’t mean any harm, mister. We’re headed for the main island to par-ty.”

      Grimes figured her for her mid-to-late thirties. She had a nice body. Obviously, she had plenty of money to spend on cosmetic lifts, tucks and implants.

      “Yeah,” a guy on the lower deck yelled. He held up a camera with along zoom lens and clicked some pictures of the skiff and then of Grimes. “Say cheese. We’ve been filming you. I wanted to get some up-close shots of your rig over there.” The camera’s shutter clicked several more times as the man swiveled the lens from the skiff to the floating platform about a hundred yards away. “Got any good-looking girls on that thing could give me some nudie poses?”

      “Oh, Norm, you’re such a perv,” a second woman, standing next to him, said. She gave his shoulder a playful slap.

      These two looked drunk, as well.

      “Hey,” the cameraman said, still looking through the viewfinder. “You guys doing some kind of salvage operation over there?” He lowered his camera, pointing toward the platform. “Look at that. A submersible. Bigger than the one we used to use, Harv.”

      “Oh yeah?” Harv raised a set of binoculars to his eyes and studied the scene. “Well, I’ll be damned. It sure is. We used to do underwater salvage. What’s down there?”

      Grimes’s head whipped around. The second submersible was alongside the launch, and the divers were assembling as the crane arm hovered above them.

      An unfortunate turn of events, thought Grimes. The last thing we need is a bunch of drunks shooting their mouths off about our operation at some island bar and showing photos. Especially if they know about salvage ops. He exhaled slowly, then said to Tanner in a low tone, “This

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