“Hey, guys?” Maddie said, cutting into the conversation. “Sorry to break up the girl talk, but there’s something you have to see down here, Lara.”
“Where are you?” Lara asked.
“The swimming area on the lower deck.”
“I’m on my way.”
Lara cut through the fancy dining room to reach the back of the boat sooner. She hadn’t expected to find something like it onboard, but then she’d never been on a luxury yacht before. The more she explored, the more possibilities she saw. There were so many rooms and spaces that could be put to other uses. It could work, she thought, with enough time and preparation. She just had to make a decision.
Because they’ll do what I tell them. God help me, they’ll actually do what I tell them.
She climbed down the rung of stairs at the rear of the boat and hopped the last few feet to the lower deck. Maddie was waiting for her with her hands on her hips.
“What is it?” Lara asked, walking over.
“We’re not alone,” Maddie said. “Keo was right. There’s someone else still on the boat.”
“How do you know?”
Maddie pointed at a pair of shoe prints on the all-white deck. Lara didn’t know what she was supposed to see. There were a lot of prints, which made sense since she, Maddie, and the others had been coming and going all morning.
“What about them?” Lara said.
“They’re not ours, Lara.”
“How can you tell?”
“We’re all wearing boots. Those are tennis shoes.”
Lara stared again, but she couldn’t tell the difference. “Are you sure?”
“One hundred percent,” Maddie nodded.
Lara instinctively put her right hand over her holstered sidearm and looked back at the two decks above and behind them. “How long ago?”
“I just noticed them now, but they look pretty fresh. They weren’t here when we came back earlier. That means whoever it was, he was checking out our boat. Maybe looking for a way off.”
“Just one pair of prints?”
“Just the one.”
Lara unclipped her radio and keyed it. “Blaine, where are you?”
“I’m still on the bridge,” Blaine answered. “What’s wrong?”
“It looks like that eighth guy exists after all.”
“Figures,” Blaine said. “What do you want us to do?”
“I’m heading back to the island with Maddie, then I’m sending her back over with Roy. Until then, I want you to lock the bridge door. Don’t open it for anyone until we have more men onboard to take this boat apart floor by floor.”
“Roger that.”
Lara looked into the deck behind them. The windows weren’t tinted enough to hide the rooms on the other side, but she had discovered for herself that the Trident was deceptively larger in person than it appeared on the outside. There were too many rooms, too many hallways, and too many corners to hide in.
“Come out, come out, wherever you are,” she whispered softly to herself.
Gage, the “captain” of the Trident, looked healthy for a man who had just been shot in the kneecap with his own gun less than twenty-four hours ago. He sat on one of the beds they had repurposed from the unused hotel rooms and put into the makeshift infirmary. He was still wearing the same clothes from last night, though one of his pant legs had been cut away to treat his wound.
Zoe looked over from the counter where she was scribbling on a notepad when Lara knocked on the open door. Benny, who sat guard across from Gage, looked up before quickly turning off the PlayStation Vita portable gaming console in his hands. One of the benefits of the island was the electronic devices. They didn’t have the Internet anymore, of course, but laptops and computers (and the games on them) were still useable.
Lara pretended she didn’t see Benny scrambling to put the PS Vita away and said to Zoe, “How is he, doc?”
“See for yourself,” Zoe said. She swiveled around in her stool. “Stan’s making him one of those leg braces like Benny’s. Once he has that, our fair captain should be up and marauding again in a few days. He’ll just be a lot more gimpy, that’s all.”
If Gage was insulted by being called a “marauder,” he didn’t show it. Not that he had any right to take offense. The word was appropriate, given what he and the friends had planned to do to Song Island. In the few minutes she’d talked to the man, Gage hadn’t lied to her once. Or, at least, she hadn’t caught him in an obvious falsehood yet. In fact, the man seemed at home with what he was and what he had done. She hadn’t expected that, and a part of her was actually impressed with his frankness.
She sat down on a chair at the foot of his bed. “The eighth man. Does he have a name?”
“I thought you didn’t believe he existed,” Gage said. “You didn’t care about his name back when I told you and that Chinese guy about him.”
“Korean,” Benny said.
“What?” Gage said.
“Keo’s half-Korean, asshole.”
“Same difference.”
“Answer the question,” Lara said.
“Boris,” Gage said, turning back to her. “His name’s Boris.”
“Is he Russian?”
Gage smirked. “Nah. It’s just what we call him.”
“Why?”
“Did you find him yet?”
“No. But we will. Tell me about Boris.”
“What’s to tell? He was a crewman on the Trident before I even signed up. After we, er, took over, he decided to stay onboard. He knows that boat better than everyone, including me.”
“You gave him a choice to stay or leave?”
“Of course I did,” Gage said, sounding almost offended. “Everyone who stayed did so because they wanted to. I didn’t have to force anyone.”
“What happened to the owners of the boat?” Zoe asked.
Gage looked past Lara at the doctor. “We took the boat,” he said, as if that should explain everything.
“How did you take the boat?”
“How do you think we took the boat? They didn’t exactly want to give it up. So we took it.”
“What will Boris do next?” Lara asked.
“What do you mean?” Gage said, shifting back to her.
“Will he try to get off the boat? Like the other two did last night?”
“I have no idea. It’s not like we’re joined at the hip. I captained the boat, and he worked the decks.”
“He sweep the poop deck?” Benny grinned.
Lara ignored him and said to Gage, “Is he dangerous?”
Gage shrugged. “It’s a dangerous world. Who isn’t, these days?”
Lara stared at him for a moment, trying to decide if the man was holding something back. Gage was in his late thirties, with a hardened face that had seen a lot of sunlight over its lifetime. She could imagine this man nonchalantly shooting the Trident’s previous owner and assuming command simply because he could. She’d guess that anyone who traveled with him would be capable of that same level of violence.
She nodded and stood up. “Okay.”
“What about me?” Gage asked.
“What about you?”
“What happens to me now?”
“I haven’t decided yet. Right now, you’re still valuable because I might need someone to pilot the boat. But that doesn’t mean I’ll hesitate to throw you into the water if you endanger my people in any way. I’m betting that with time, I can teach someone to push all those buttons on the bridge.”
“Yeah, but there are so, so many buttons,” Gage said, grinning at her. When he didn’t get the reaction he was expecting, he lost the stupid grin and frowned instead. “Look, truth is, I was a captain before all of this, and I can be your captain, too. I mean, I’m not above taking orders. I did it for most of my life. I can do it again.”