The rest of his words vanished beneath the sound of a cabin door slamming aboard the yacht. The stern gate leading to the swim step opened with an oil-me screech and then closed. Hard.
Emma held her breath. A glint of gold along the boat’s side caught her eye. Warily she looked up. If there had been any doubt about the boat’s identity, the nameplate removed it.
BLACKBIRD.
“Do you believe in resurrection?” she asked very softly into her mic.
“No. Death and lies? Oh yeah. I believe.”
Mac was glad that they didn’t need to worry much about being absolutely quiet. Amanar was thundering over the dock like a buffalo, Lovich was screaming curses, and everyone in the harbor who could hear was riveted on the mouthy newcomer at the fuel dock.
For Mac and Emma, the black hull of the yacht provided a perfect screen from the action on the dock.
“Faster,” he said and dug his paddle deep into the water.
She tried to keep up with him, but his upper body strength was easily three times hers. By the time he reached the swim step, she was thirty feet behind.
Mac’s kayak tenderly nudged
Emma glided close enough to touch him.
“Shove my kayak toward the middle of the harbor,” he said very softly into his mic. “Send the paddle after it.”
Before she finished dumping the excess gear, he grabbed the chrome rail and levered himself onto the swim step as easily as a gymnast mounting flying rings. But she knew that it wasn’t easy. It was a wrenching exercise in naked strength.
“Hey, Spiderman,” she said in quiet disgust to her mic. “You going to beam me aboard?”
“You’re mixing your superheroes.”
“I figured it would take two.”
He made a low sound that could have been laughter. Then he caught the bow of her kayak and drew it alongside the swim step, holding her steady.
“Send your paddle toward the middle of the bay,” he said.
She aimed her paddle on top of the water and shoved it off into the darkness.
“Now grab my wrists,” he said.
She locked her fingers around his wrists and felt his own hands clamp around hers. Without being told, she drew up her knees. Before she could take a breath, he lifted her clear of the kayak and steadied her on the dark swim step.
“Good?” he murmured.
“Yes. Go.”
With a lithe movement, he levered himself over the gunwale and its rail. Then they locked wrists again. He brought her aboard with barely a brushing sound. It was certainly a lot quieter than the squeaky gate would have been.
Mac touched her lips and his own in a gesture asking silence.
She nodded.
Both of them duck-walked along the port side of
In the background, Amanar joined his cousin in a cussing duet. Whatever the insurance agent was telling them, they didn’t want to hear it.
Mac reached into his small backpack and pulled out a folding knife. He thumbed it open and gave it to Emma, handle first.
“Stay down.” His voice was a bare thread of sound. “When I give the signal from the bow, cut us loose at the stern.”
She looked at the knife’s serrated blade, then tested its edge very lightly with her thumb. The wicked little teeth tugged at her skin, nearly drawing blood. She nodded approvingly.
Mac touched her elbow, then scuttled across the aft deck, keeping his head below the gunwale.
On the dock, Amanar began repeating himself at a higher volume. Anything that wasn’t stone deaf would know what he thought about the size of the caller’s brain and gonads.
At the starboard rail, Mac straightened a little and ran, head low, to the bow.
Emma glanced again through the stainless hawsehole toward the fuel dock. Her breath stopped when she saw Lovich glance in the direction of
If he saw anything out of place, he didn’t point it out to Amanar.
Mac looked at the bowline and wanted to curse along with the cousins.
Unlike the stern line, which led directly from the inside cleat through a hawsehole and from there to the dock, the bowline had been looped back on itself through the hawsehole. It was under too much tension to work free.
Mac needed the knife he’d given to Emma.
From the stern, she watched as he grabbed the line with both hands. She could sense the effort as he tried to pull in enough slack to back the twisted loop off one horn of the cleat.
No good.
The shouts from the fuel dock were getting fewer and further between.
She crouched low and duck-walked toward the shelter of the salon. Once there she straightened enough to move fast. Within seconds she was crouched beside Mac in the shelter of the bow. She passed over the knife handle first.
Swiftly he laid the blade to a taut portion of the mooring line. The braided nylon was under strain, holding the yacht to the fuel dock. The knife passed through the heavy line like it was cold butter. When there were only a few threads left, he handed the knife back to Emma.
“Same for the stern?” she breathed.
“No. Clean through. I’ll signal.”
There wasn’t time to argue about a cut line splashing into the water near the dock or sawing a boat free before the engines came on. Emma just scuttled back to the stern the fastest way she could.
Mac followed as far as the pilot house door. He stayed out of sight of the dock as he checked the electrical switches in the panel next to the wheel.
Emma went back to her position at the stern hawsehole and watched through the glass door of the salon toward the pilot house. Wind swirled, shifting, pressing
Mac raised his head long enough to check the settings at the helm. “Cut,” he said.
She started cutting, only to find out that it wasn’t as easy as the bowline.
The stern tie was slack.
Mac stood up behind the wheel, knowing that the motion would betray him to anyone watching. If nothing else, the computer screen was bright enough to backlight him. He glanced over his shoulder to see how Emma was doing. The lazy curve of the stern line told him what was wrong.
Desperately she tried to take up the slack in the line with one hand and cut with the other. It worked, but she was barely halfway through the thick line.
“Hey!” Lovich bellowed across the dock to
