Jason didn’t have girlfriend problems because there hadn’t been any girlfriends, not for years. For Jason, the cliché was true: if you don’t believe in yourself, you can’t get someone else to believe in you either. As great a fighter as he was, the reality was that the constant failures related to Manta World had affected him. In fact, they’d quietly crushed his soul. He hadn’t believed in himself for some time. Like everyone, Jason wanted a wife and family one day, but not tomorrow. For the moment at least, he was better off alone.
They made great time, moving past Baja into the waters off San Diego, then Orange County, then Clarita Island. No one except Darryl was paying particular attention when they passed Clarita’s main docks. His eyes narrowed when the Expedition motored toward a familiar rock outcropping on the island’s isolated western shore. He didn’t know why, but he sensed something was there.
“We’re here.”
CHAPTER 8
LISA BARTON watched as Jason stared down at the dark, rolling waters. No, they weren’t in tropical Mexico anymore. It was an hour before sunset, and they’d anchored off Clarita. All of them except Darryl Hollis were suited up in full-length black neoprene wet suits. In yellow mesh shorts and a black tank top, Darryl would stand watch on the boat while everyone else scanned below. They quickly went over the predive checklist, confirming that regulators, dive lights, and all of the other equipment were working. They were about to jump in when Monique noticed a seagull plunging into the sea. “I wonder how the fishing is today.” Then the bird popped up, devouring a struggling silver snack. “Looks like it’s pretty good.”
THEY DESCENDED slowly, feeling the water’s chill around their bodies. Good visibility, Phil thought, pausing to check the camera strap around his neck.
Farther below, Jason surveyed. With the aid of dive maps, he’d chosen this exact spot carefully. Though Darryl and Monique had plotted the route to get here, Jason wouldn’t trust them with choosing the exact area in which to dive; it was too delicate. They were very close to deep waters here, unreachable not only by scuba but by almost anything—or at least by anything man-made. The area directly below, however, was only a hundred and fifty feet deep. It looked like an underwater quarry of sorts, a massive brown boulder the size of a ten-story office building, off to the right. Jason followed Monique and Craig toward it.
As Monique swam along the huge rock, it seemed to grow in size, becoming a small mountain. Then, as she passed a few foot-long kelp strands, she realized there was a second mountain, about ten feet to the left, that created a narrow canyon. She turned on her flashlight and swam right into it, shadows engulfing her. Eyeing the dark sandy bottom far below, she wondered if there were any secrets there. Then she saw movement out of the corner of her eye. She froze. Adjacent to a deep horizontal crevice, she realized something was inside it. Jason swam up next to her, and they shined their lights in. It was a small school of cod, about thirty of them, the light streaming past their dark green bodies. Another midsea species. Neither asked the question audibly, but Jason and Monique both wondered why the cod were all the way up here. Phil swam next to them and snapped a picture. They dove farther. Three stories from the bottom, the walls abruptly widened, and they fanned out. Reaching the sand, they flipped over, entering an area the size of a living room, the walls mottled brown rock.
To her right, Monique noticed a gap at the bottom of the wall. She knelt, illuminating the sand within, and it was obvious: the sand had been disturbed by something. Not by water currents—there were no sweeping patterns—but by an animal of some kind. She lay down to get a better look. Farther in, the sand looked even more disturbed. She tried to wedge herself in, but her tank caught. She pushed her hand toward the area. She could almost reach it….
She stopped. Was something still there? She pulled her hand away. No, she didn’t think so. She noticed Lisa kneeling at another gap and swam over. Lisa was eyeing a piece of kelp, just floating in the gap. Through their masks, the women shared a look. Kelp was a surface seaweed. Even if there had been nearby forests, which there weren’t, it was unusual to see it in water this deep. Had something brought it here? Monique grabbed the strand and studied it. She saw nothing special and let it go. Instantly, Jason swam up, grabbed it, and took a look for himself. Monique and Lisa shook their heads. On the far wall, Phil laughed heartily inside his mask. Good old trusting Jason.
As they ascended out of the canyon for the first time, they noticed the terrain to their left. The sun had shifted, and the area was much more fully lit than it had been a moment ago. Jason spotted something on the sand that he’d missed earlier. A small pool of darkness, a mini–oil slick, probably from a local fisherman illegally dumping. Then he noticed that something was in the pool. He drifted downward. It was a marking of some kind. He kicked toward it. It was an imprint. He kicked closer still. An enormous imprint, fourteen feet across the wings and twelve feet long. As the others joined him, he shook his head inside his mask. How do you like that?
WHY’S HE holding that harpoon? Jason was immediately nervous as he popped out of the water. And why does he have that look on his face? Jason had never seen Darryl Hollis with such a look. But Darryl just scanned the dark seas, not even acknowledging him. “How’s it going, Jason?”
Does he have peripheral vision I’m not aware of? “Hey, Darryl. You OK?”
“Fine. See anything good?”
Jason removed his mask. “Yeah. What’s with the harpoon?”
Darryl finally looked down. “I guess sunsets just make me nervous.”
Jason turned. A sunset indeed. The sky was gorgeous, a vast tapestry of lavender, pink, and ruby red. Jason loved Southern California’s sunsets and knew from personal experience that they were some of the most stunning in the world.
Monique popped out and smiled, as relaxed as ever. “Hey, Husband.”
“Get out of the water, Monique.”
“What’s your problem? Nice to see you, too.”
Darryl turned to her directly. “Monique, get out of the water.”
She was about to tell Darryl to shut his smug mouth when she noticed his harpoon. Darryl Hollis never played games with his weapons. She got out of the water.
“What’s up, Big Dog?” Craig smacked Darryl’s back later on deck. “Something big and bad out here?”
Darryl hesitated. He didn’t know why, but he suddenly felt like an idiot. He scanned the dark seas anew, little waves breaking here and there. They seemed to be laughing at him now.
“Nothing big and bad here except me, brother.”
Craig glanced at Monique. They’d both seen Darryl become alarmed before, more times than they cared to remember, in dangerous war-torn deserts, soft-sand Caribbean vacations, scuba diving, sometimes just when it was dark out and the crickets were chirping. There were occasionally good reasons for it, but very often there weren’t.
“How do you think that kelp got all the way down there, Monique?”
Monique turned to Jason. “You know, I don’t know. Darryl, we saw some kelp almost two hundred feet down. And a manta imprint in an oil slick.”