Death Echo

“On the weather?” she asked sweetly.

“On how bad they missed the forecast the first time.”

“I don’t know much about weather, and less about water, but…” Her voice faded into the hiss and smack of waves against the hull.

“Yeah.” Mac looked at the whitecaps, measured how much spray lifted into the air. “The wind looks closer to twenty than fifteen, much less ten. The gusts are at least twenty-five.”

“Still want to go to Campbell River?” she asked.

“Is your stomach kicking?”

Emma looked surprised. “No. Should it be?”

“Some people get seasick on a floating dock.”

“Guess I’m not one of them.”

“We could take a lot more wind than this and be perfectly safe,” Mac said. “Unless you’re uneasy-”

“As in puke green?” she said, smiling.

“Yeah.”

“I’m not.”

“So kick the throttles up a notch and keep going.”

“How much is a notch?” she asked.

“Take it up to twenty knots, more if the motion doesn’t bother you. We’ve got time to make up.”

“Aye, aye, Captain,” she said, and hit the throttles.

The sound of the diesels deepened. The wake behind the boat churned out even more white. Surprisingly, the ride didn’t change much, neither smoother nor rougher. The fuel consumption sure shifted, though.

“We’re filling up the tanks in Campbell, right?” she asked.

“Yes. Why?”

“We eat a lot more diesel at this speed.”

“Wait until you see it above twenty-four knots. Sucks diesel like water flushing down a head,” he said.

“Expensive.”

“If you can afford Blackbird, the cost of the fuel it takes to run her is small change.”

As Mac spoke, he reached across Emma for the binoculars that were held snugly in a grip near the pilot station.

“Looking for logs?” she asked.

“If I have to use glasses to find them, the logs are too far away to worry about.”

“Good to know. I’ve been wondering.”

He grunted.

After a moment Emma straightened in the seat and leaned over the wheel, staring into the water ahead.

“Is that a boat out there?” she asked. “Just to the left of the bow.”

Mac was already watching the shape through the binoculars.

“Twenty-eight-foot motorboat. Red gunwale stripe. Fisherman’s special. You want to see something suck fuel? Try opening the throttles on those two big Yamahas strapped to the stern of that boat. Probably go twenty-two knots, maybe twenty-four. Hell of a butt-breaking ride, though. Especially in this chop.”

“Is that why the boat is going so slow? It’s barely moving.”

“I noticed.”

Mac refocused the glasses.

Redhead II all but disappeared as a wave broke against its side. Someone with wild, wet red hair was hunched over the steering arm of the kicker, getting whitewashed as often as not.

The boat wallowed like a half-beached log.

“They’re on the kicker but no fishing gear is out,” Mac said. “Steer an intercept course.”

Emma started to ask about kickers and fishing gear, but Mac leaned across her and lifted the radio microphone out of its cradle. Before he could use it, the radio crackled to life.

“…calling the black-hulled yacht off Nanoose,” said a man’s voice. “I have a visual of you.”

“Blackbird here. I didn’t catch your name. Switch to six-eight.”

A few seconds later, on the new channel, a man’s voice said, “Blackbird, we’re having trouble with a fuel filter or the electrical system. Hard to be certain in this water. Can you assist us?”

It wasn’t a request Mac could or would refuse. He was the only boat within sight, he had the skill and the means to aid the smaller boat, and the weather was going downhill. Marine law-and simple decency-insisted he do what he could to help.

He focused the glasses on the stern of the pitching boat, where her name was written in bold script.

“Redhead II,” he said, “stand by for assistance. Can you turn her into the wind?”

“I think-yes, the captain says we can.”

“That will make it easier. Stand by on six-eight, please.”

“Thank you.”

Staring at the boat ahead, Mac held the microphone, then said, “I’ll take it from here.”

“Good.”

Emma shot out of the pilot position. The thought of steering Blackbird close to another boat in this water was enough to lift the hair on the back of her neck. Mac, on the other hand, seemed to take it for granted.

“Call Faroe,” Mac said as he took the wheel. “Have him check the registration on a Canadian pleasure boat, about twenty-eight feet, called Redhead II.”

Maybe it’s not the idea of getting close to the boat that’s making my neck tingle, she thought.

“Are you suspicious?” she asked.

“Aren’t you?”

“Now that I’m not busy running the boat, yes.”

“If you can, get a photo of both people on Redhead II,” he said, easing back on the throttles.

“Dumb arm-candy taking shots for the folks back home?”

“Better that no one catches you and wonders why you’re taking pictures.”

“My camera’s zoom will be a snotty bitch to use out here.”

“I have faith in you.”

Emma wanted to roll her eyes. Instead, she punched Faroe’s number on her phone.

A voice answered immediately.

“Hi, Emma. This is Lane. Dad and Mom are on other lines. Since you didn’t roll over to Steele, he’s busy, too.”

Emma looked at her phone. “You sound just like Faroe. Can you take a message?”

She heard a swivel-type office chair squeak and rattle across a tiled floor.

“Sure,” Lane said. “Ready.”

“Are you up north pretending to be on vacation?”

“Nope. San Diego. I’ve got university classes, but not today.” His voice said just how much he loved being left behind.

Quickly she relayed Mac’s request, and added, “I’ll be sending jpgs ASAP and will want the people in them identified double-ASAP.”

Lane grunted, sounding so much like Faroe that she couldn’t help smiling. If she could have a kid like Lane… well, the idea of a family suddenly appealed. She wondered idly how Mac felt about it.

“Processing boat ID as we speak,” Lane said. “Want me to call back with the info?”

She looked out over the bow of Blackbird. They were closing quickly with the smaller boat.

“Only if it’s in the next two minutes,” she said. “After that, send to my computer. Or Mac’s. Whatever. Just get it to us.”