Jack Rogan: The Ocean Dark

A heavyset Hispanic woman checked her ticket, let her pass. A sign on the wall said TICKETED PASSENGERS ONLY BEYOND THIS POINT. A warm flush ran up the back of her neck, maybe the heat of Ted’s eyes upon her, maybe just exultation. She probably should have turned to wave, just to make sure he didn’t suspect. If he did, he might buy a ticket, try to come after her before the train pulled away. That would ruin everything. But she couldn’t turn.

He’d still be watching, though. She knew that much. Right now he’d be watching her go, the anger and resentment already building up inside of him. When she got back, he’d make her regret having gone, just like he had the first time. When she got back …

Halfway down the stairs into the underground platform area, she finally let the smile bloom. It terrified her, that smile. Too soon, she knew. Her whole body trembled and where she’d been warm before, she now felt a terrible chill. God, she needed a drink. Screwdriver — vodka and orange juice — an old-fashioned drink, totally uncool, but God, they tasted good. And if you got the mix right, they were deadly.

She needed to drink.

But she wouldn’t. Not until she reached her destination. Maybe, if she had the strength — and she was beginning to think she might — not even then.

“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” she whispered. “Don’t be stupid, bitch.”

She winced, sickened by the word, by the knowledge that he’d trained her so well, taught her who she was and what she was good for. Hating Ted and herself and unsure which of them she hated more.

The train idled, engines rumbling, wanting to go, a racehorse ready for the starter’s pistol. She turned right, stepped on board, and moved herself in among the other passengers, looking for a seat. Passing one by. A perfectly good seat, plenty of space. And then another.

She kept her eyes front, knowing he couldn’t see her but terrified that he could, that somehow he’d realized and come down after her and even now walked along the outside of the train peering in windows, watching her. Her stomach roiled and bile rose up in the back of her throat. Her eyes burned and she bit her lip to keep from crying. A part of her mind — the part that kept silent while he beat her, the part who’d gotten halfway to believing she deserved it — screamed at her to stop, to get off, to run upstairs and confess and apologize and take her punishment and never do it again, because what he would do when he found her would be so much worse.

It got so bad she had to stop and take a breath.

“Are you all right?” a woman asked — dark hair, kind eyes, well-dressed. A stranger, really wanting to know.

She could only nod and move on.

Into the next car, picking up momentum now. The train hissed and she knew she had to hurry. Suitcase in her hand knocking into people, muttering apologies, not waiting to see if they were accepted. Bells dinged inside the train and it would be soon.

Into the next car, far, far out of sight of the stairs.

Turn right again, out the door, onto the platform, into the shadows.

Heart so loud, pulsing, she could feel it in her face and hands and she closed her eyes, a tear sliding down her cheek, still clutching the heavy suitcase. A conductor looked at her oddly from the window.

“If you’re coming, honey, you better get on. Doors are closing,” he called, over the growl of the train.

She took a deep breath. And shook her head.

The conductor shrugged and turned his attention back to the passengers on board. Electronic voices crackled inside the train, then the doors closed, and there could be no turning back now. The voice deep inside screamed that she had done it now, that Ted would never let her forget it.

She licked her lips, throat parched, wishing for orange juice and vodka, and watched the train judder, hitch, then pull out of the station. Would Ted still be upstairs? Would he be trying to peer down the steps, get a glimpse of her departure, or would he already be back on the street, headed downtown, into the swirl of drugs and hookers and brutality that was his life’s work?

The train vanished into the tunnel car by car until only the rear lights were visible.

She would wait, fifteen minutes at least. Maybe thirty, just to be sure Ted would be gone. What if he went for coffee without her, now that he thought she had left? Better make it an hour.

Resigned to waiting, she set down her suitcase. Her hands still shook, but she took a breath and her heartbeat began, at last, to slow.

The force of the explosion blew her off her feet.

Captain Rio double-timed it up the metal steps to the wheelhouse. The bridge, people called it. If you were in the Navy or watched too much Star Trek , that was fine. But Gabe and Miguel had been raised by a fisherman, so it would always be the wheelhouse to them.

Metal clanged underfoot as he reached the landing, whipped the door open, and stepped in. The windows looked out on what seemed like acres of brown and gray steel containers. Beyond them lay the wide ocean, bright aqua all the way to the horizon, where it met the powder blue of the sky. The sun shone down on the Caribbean. Most people, seeing that view, would have thought it looked like paradise, but Gabe had seen men die at sea. He’d known people who had drowned because they were too far away from the help they’d needed to survive. He’d been through storms that seemed like the end of the world. He loved the sea, but had no romantic illusions about it. The open ocean was no different from desert badlands — anything could happen out here.

The second mate, Suarez, had the wheel. That was all right. The old Cuban knew more about ships than Gabe would ever learn. Miguel, the Antoinette ’s chief mate, was shouting into the radio handset, and the fire and frustration in his eyes set Gabe off immediately.

Ortega’s house is coming down . That had been the message he sent with Dwyer. Nobody else would know what the hell it meant, just part of the secret language of brothers, the lexicon of shared childhood in a small town on the Gulf Coast of Mexico, when they’d walked up the street in the aftermath of a hurricane and watched as a neighbor’s house, still mostly standing, collapsed under the weight of its own ruin. Ortega and his pretty daughter, Miranda, had died in there. Maybe had been dying while the Rio brothers watched their home slide down on top of them.

It meant disaster. Some people would have said Code Red, but this was more than that. Ortega’s house is coming down meant Code Fucked.

“Miguel!” Gabe snapped, striding across the wheelhouse.

His brother spun around, his eyes alight with fire and frustration.

“Shut up!” Miguel shouted into the radio. “Just be quiet and listen to me!”

“—God has turned from me! They are all damned now, but you can save me! Now, before it gets dark again—”

“Fuck,” Miguel growled, then thumbed the toggle on the radio again. “Slow down, idiot. What happened? Are the guns safe?”

The second the word was out of his mouth, Miguel gritted his teeth, cursing himself, knowing what he’d done.

Gabe strode across the wheelhouse and snatched the radio from his brother’s hand. The man on the other end — someone on board the ship they were supposed to rendezvous with — had started screaming about God again. Terror or madness had given him religion; either one was bad news.

“Mickey, this is Donald,” Captain Rio said. “Go to radio silence, right now. Use your tracer signal. Radio silence, goddammit!”

He took his thumb off the toggle and for a second he thought his words had been heeded. But then he heard the breathing, quick sharp breaths, almost whimpering. Through the radio, they heard the man on the other end begin to whisper the Hail Mary in Spanish.