Джон Сэндфорд - Ocean Prey [calibre]

“Just wondering,” Virgil said. “No offense.”

Lange and Regio helped carry the dive gear up to the apartment, where they were met by a stoned Rae who was watching a jewelry sale on QVC.

“Fuckin’ place doesn’t look like it’d have cable,” Regio said.

“It doesn’t,” Rae said. “This is over-the-air.”

Regio blinked. “You gotta be shittin’ me.”

They agreed that Regio and Lange wouldn’t have to go along when Virgil picked up the DPV and the tanks. “Three days from now, we want to see you on Key Largo at a place called Sunrise Dive,” Lange said. “We’ll be riffin’ on your Bahamas rich-man story. We’re going to put you with a dive instructor to evaluate your . . . abilities. We’ll tell her that story about you being hired by the rich guy to teach him how to be a pro diver.”

“A test,” Virgil said.

“Damn straight,” Regio said. “Don’t even think about hocking that gear and running back to Iowa. We got guys in Iowa.”

Rae handed Virgil a joint and he took a long pull at it, wrenched his face into a model of stoned sincerity, and let some smoke roll out of his lungs. “You said a million bucks. I’d kill your mother for a million bucks. Both your mothers.”

Rae said, “Shit, we’d kill Willy’s mother for a million bucks, the racist old bitch.”

Lange said, “We’ll see you in Key Largo. We’ll call you tomorrow with the time.”

“If you’ve got this other diver, the one who’s gonna test me, then why me?” Virgil asked.

“She’s not with us. She’s somebody we checked on, a dive instructor. Jack talked to her to see if she could do this kind of evaluation. She could. But watch your mouth when you’re around her.”

“Three days,” Rae said. And: “Listen . . . you guys wanna get high?”

Regio put up a hand: “I’m a Scotch guy. I don’t even like the smell of that shit. Smells like wet burning leaves back in Jersey.”

When Regio and Lange had gone, Virgil called Lucas: “We got the real deal, man. These are the dope guys. I don’t know if they were involved in killing the Coast Guardsmen, but they could have been. Put them in the right clothes and they fit the descriptions.”

“Good work. When you were in the scuba place we put a locator on their Lexus. We’d be following them right now, except they drove up the block, did a U-turn, and are sitting on the street watching your door.”

“Don’t let them see you. This’ll be tricky enough without them smelling something wrong.”

“We’re cool.”

“I know that you are. I’m worried about me .”

CHAPTER

EIGHTEEN

For the next two days, Virgil and Rae walked and drove around Hollywood and Fort Lauderdale, and went shopping at a downscale mall where Rae bought high-heeled sandals and Virgil got a T-shirt that showed a picture of a guitar with a caption that said, old musicians never die, they just decompose.

Late on the second day, Virgil picked up the Genesis DPV and the freshly filled tanks at Scuba City, and spent the evening rigging the backplate and wing so he’d be ready to dive. The day after that, with Rae driving the old Subaru, they headed south through the concrete canyons of Miami to the Florida Keys.

“I hope this piece of junk makes it that far,” Rae said. “We’re at 240,000 miles.”

“I’ve been told that everything mechanical was rehabbed,” Virgil said. “Shouldn’t be a problem.”

“Speaking of problems, did you bring your nine-millimeter problem solver?”

“I don’t much believe in pistols,” Virgil said.

“Lucas told me that,” Rae said. “Besides, it’s only Mafia killers we’re dealing with.”

The back of the Outback was stuffed with the scuba gear and a plastic suitcase with a change of clothing for both of them, in case they wound up staying overnight. As they went through Florida City, Rae slowed, searching roadside signs, and then pointed out the motel where Bob was killed.

“Best friend I ever had, or ever will have,” Rae said.

“Sounds like a hell of a guy,” Virgil said. “Lucas has lost a couple of friends, but he was really shook up by Bob. His wife was worried that he was falling into a clinical depression. He’s had that trouble in the past.”

“Not good,” Rae said.

“Figuring out what we’d do about Bob, that pulled him out of it, I guess,” Virgil said. “The last time I talked to his wife, she said he was back on solid ground.”

“I’m not there yet,” Rae said.

South of Florida City, they ran through scrubland, then onto causeways through mangrove swamps and eventually off the two-lane highway and onto four lanes into the town of Key Largo. They passed the entrance to John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park, went on a few more minutes, and turned left at a sign that led down a coral road to Sunrise Scuba.

“One o’clock, right on time,” Rae said. “Wonder if Matt and Marc are here . . .”

Regio and Lange pulled in two minutes later, as Virgil was looking around the scuba center’s layout. The Sunrise consisted of a compact red-tile-roofed, white-painted concrete block building, a small parking lot surrounded by five-foot palms, an oversized swimming pool with a diving board at one end. Two tiger-striped cats, one gray, one red, lazed on the sidewalk outside the building’s front door.

“Talked to anyone yet?” Regio asked.

“Just got here,” Virgil said.

Lange: “The instructor’s name is Julie Andrews. Not the Julie Andrews.”

“Right.”

Inside the building they were met by a balding man with a hat line across his forehead—stark white on top, burned below—and heavy chest and shoulders. He checked the four of them and decided to talk to Lange: “You’re the Willy Carter party?”

Lange poked a finger at Virgil: “He’s Willy.”

The man turned and shouted, “Julie, they’re here.”

A woman walked out of a back room, fiftyish, short, stocky, with cropped blond hair. She was wearing knee-length shorts and a coral-colored knit shirt with a Sunrise Scuba logo. She scanned the four of them and asked, “Carter?”

“That’s me,” Virgil said, half-raising a hand.

She looked him over—T-shirt, cargo shorts, worn tennis shoes, hair on his shoulders—and asked, “What’s with . . .” She waved a hand at Lange, Regio, and Rae.

Virgil looked at Lange and said, “I thought you explained all of this?”

“The basics,” Lange said. “Told them that we wanted to check your qualifications.”

Virgil turned back to Andrews. “Here’s the thing. I’m supposed to train this rich guy in the Bahamas. He wants to be sure I can do it, because he doesn’t want to drown.”

“Why didn’t he hire us?” the bald man asked. “We can go to the Bahamas.”

“’Cause he’s my uncle,” Virgil said. “My mom suggested that I could train him. He’s skeptical. These two guys . . .” he tipped his head at Lange and Regio, “. . . are supposed to check out you, before you’re checking out me.”

“Seems a weird way to go about it,” Andrews said.

“Well, it is,” Virgil agreed. “I had a little legal trouble in Montana and my mom wants to get me away from my friends up there. She got Jerry to hire me.”

“Jerry?”

“Uncle Jerry.”

“What do Matt and Marc do . . .”

“They’re, uh, Uncle Jerry’s . . . uh . . .”

“Security team,” Rae said. “Part of it, anyway.”

Andrews looked at Regio and Lange and said, “Okay. I’ll buy that. Still seems strange.”

“You don’t have to jump through your ass trying to figure out who we work for and why, you just gotta take Willy down to the bottom of the ocean and come back up and tell us if he’s a bullshitter,” Regio said, in a voice that approximated a snarl. “That’s all. That’s why we’re renting your whole boat and your whole day and night.”