Elizabeth Lowell - Death Echo

Caution was also why he tied fenders on the dock side of the boat. He didn’t want sudden wind or current to push him against the dock and mar Blackbird ’s hull. Salt washed off. Scrapes didn’t.

As he stepped back into the cabin, he heard the radio’s impatient crackle.

“Stop wasting our time playing with fenders, Mac,” Lovich said. “That boat can dock herself.”

Only if the captain knows the drill. Even a pod drive isn’t idiot-proof.

Yeah, the worst part of his job was the owners.

Mac knew that Blackbird was equipped with the latest and greatest pod drives, but he didn’t want to rely on a system he’d never used in the close quarters of a marina. He knew what the boat would do if he used the twin throttles for maneuvering. He couldn’t say the same about the joystick for the pod drives.

Mac glanced around the deck, planning his moves, and then stepped back to the helm station inside and put the engines in gear. Dead-slow, he passed through the slot in the breakwater and entered the boat basin at a crawl. Using throttles and helm, he cruised down the outside alley, stopped and pivoted between two docks that were crowded with moored boats.

The Blue Water dock was flooded with light, more to discourage theft than for safety reasons. Mac saw three men waiting at a gap between a fifty-two-foot sailboat with tall aluminum masts and a smaller pleasure boat with a square stern and long, overhanging bowsprit. He recognized two of the men, Bob Lovich and Stan Amanar, owners of Blue Water Marine Group. The third man was a stranger.

On the approach, Mac kept going in and out of gear to keep his speed down. The gap awaiting him at the dock left him maybe two feet to spare on bow and stern.

Hoohah, this should be fun.

The tide was on a steep ebb. Beneath the glittering dark surface of the water, heavy currents pulled and shoved. He came out of gear and let Blackbird drift to a stop parallel with the gap where the three men stood, impatiently waiting for him.

Immediately Mac felt currents work on Blackbird, pushing it away from the dock. He stepped out and called to Amanar.

“You sure you want Blackbird in this spot? I’d hate to put a mark on your new boat.”

“Ever play video games?” Amanar asked.

“I’m male, what do you think?”

Lovich laughed.

The stranger didn’t change expression. Though he looked about Mac’s age physically, his eyes were older than the first sin. Mac’s instincts started crawling over his neck. He’d seen men like this stranger before, usually on a killing field.

“Forget the wheel,” Amanar said. “Use the joystick. It’s just like a video game.”

Mac didn’t hide his skeptical look.

“Go ahead,” Amanar said. “We won’t charge for scratches.”

“Your boat, your money,” Mac said.

It’s a good thing I don’t have to like someone to work for him. I’d go broke otherwise.

He went back to the helm, checked that the joystick was powered up, then cautiously tapped the upright stick toward the nine o’clock position.

More quickly than he had expected, Blackbird moved sideways toward the dock. The short burst of power cut off the instant he released the joystick, but the boat continued to move slowly sideways.

Huh. It works.

He switched the stick toward the three o’clock position for half a second. It was enough to cancel the portside drift and bring the boat to a halt.

“Be damned,” Mac said softly.

He repeated the sequence, nine, then three. Blackbird edged regally sideways, then stopped. He pushed a little longer toward nine. The boat sucked in toward the dock.

Mother of all miracles. It really works.

Some of the pod drives he had used were clumsy. This one was sweet.

He checked forward and aft. The anchor mounted on the overhanging bowsprit of the powerboat ahead of him would whittle his margin for error down to inches, so he pushed the joystick toward six o’clock. Blackbird slid a few feet out from under the threat. He pushed toward nine again, twice. Each time the boat moved sideways, against the current, as though on rails.

“Really sweet,” he said, loud enough for the men on the dock to hear.

Amanar and Lovich laughed.

The stranger showed the emotions of a cement slab.

Mac nudged the black hull closer and closer until he felt the fenders touch the rail of the dock.

“Just punch the button that says ‘Maintain,’” Amanar called.

Mac did. The twin propellers took over automatically. Blackbird held nearly motionless against the dock.

Amanar took the bowline, then the stern line, and secured Blackbird to the dock.

Mac leaned on the rail and looked down. “You’re going to put me out of business. Nobody will need a captain anymore. A baby could do it.”

“Have to be a damn rich baby,” Amanar said. “Pod drives ain’t cheap. Shut it down. You’re good.”

Mac stepped back to the helm long enough to shut down the big engines.

Lovich said something to the stranger.

Mac watched the third man, a heavy-set male with a wide Slavic face, black eyes, shoulder-length brown hair, and a well-combed mustache. He looked a lot younger than Lovich and Amanar, who were well advanced on the downhill slide to fifty. All in all, despite the longer hair, the stranger could have been Lovich’s nephew.

And he was colder and more confident than anyone Mac had ever met outside of a sniper reunion.

He caught a word or two of a language that could have been Eastern European or even Russian. Mac couldn’t be sure. Languages hadn’t been a specialty of his. He had been the backup medic and sniper for his team.

Memories stirred in him, black and red, screaming. He shoved them down and bolted the hatch.

Lose the replay, he told himself roughly. Long ago, far away, and nobody cares about it but you.

Mac shoved a line through one of the midship hawseholes and leaped onto the dock. As he bent to tie the line to a dock cleat, he deliberately brushed against the stranger.

Beneath the soft brown leather jacket there was solid muscle.

“Sorry,” Mac said. “Just need to get this line.”

The man stared at him with blank, black eyes.

Lovich murmured something in the stranger’s language.

The man watched Mac.

Suddenly the night was quiet, only the gentle lapping of water against the boats and the faint ringing sound of a loose stay hitting the mast on a nearby sailboat.

The third man said something.

Lovich nodded. “Let’s go aboard,” Amanar said, looking at his partner.

Mac watched the third man move. Though he had an athlete’s coordination, slight hesitations and adjustments in balance told Mac that the man wasn’t used to the transition between land and water. Yet his confidence was superb. He catalogued his surroundings with a few sweeping glances.

“You’re working late,” Mac said, glancing at his watch. He still had plenty of time to go to Tommy’s place for the promised drink.

Unfortunately.

Drinking and talking about the good old days weren’t Mac’s favorite ways to spend time.

Amanar hesitated, then said quickly, “We want to get a good look at her tonight. There’s going to be a rigging crew all over her soon. We have to turn her around fast.”

Mac nodded toward the dark stranger. “Is this your new owner?” Amanar didn’t answer. “If he is, tell him I know how he might double his money overnight,” Mac added.

The stranger stared at him rudely. He was a few inches under Mac’s height and perhaps forty pounds heavier. Muscle, not fat. He seemed to resent the English conversation.