“Real—and alive?” Vanessa asked.
“The man was no ghost. Trust me, sadly, I know,” Bartholomew said. He sighed. “Obviously, I can tell Sean and David, because they have a right to know. But I really don’t like telling tales when it’s someone else’s business. But people were killed. They might have been killed by Carlos Roca. The man might be stalking you. You might be his next intended victim. Vanessa, this is scary. Terrifying. And I think you’ve suspected that he’s out there. Why haven’t you told Sean?”
She was about to answer when she heard Jay’s voice, whispering to her from just beyond the door. “Vanessa? Is something wrong? Are you all right?”
“Fine, Jay!” she replied in a loud whisper. “Fine—I was singing, that’s all. Sorry!”
He laughed. “Now you’re singing! Night, sweetie.”
“Night!”
Vanessa waited until she heard him move away and then she whispered to Bartholomew. “I just can’t believe it. I really can’t. What if Carlos is trying to reach me because he is innocent, because he needs my help, because he suspects or knows what really happened?” she asked.
“You still need to tell Sean. Look, there are other lives at stake here,” he reminded her.
He touched her cheek with a ghostly hand. She thought that she could feel the warmth and tenderness. “I’m going topside, help old Marty keep watch,” he said.
She nodded. He stood and looked at her.
“I’ll tell him,” she said.
He nodded, and disappeared through the door.
Sean was surprised and glad when he arrived back on the boat to find that Vanessa was awake. She stirred when he quietly entered the cabin and stripped down to join her in bed.
“Hey,” he said softly.
She smiled in the dim light that filtered through from the dock.
“You aren’t on guard duty,” she said.
“Ted is taking a turn,” he told her. “Had to get Marty to get some sleep,” he added dryly. “Did you have a nice night? What did you do?”
She studied him carefully. “We went to a park. Jay took some footage. Let’s see, Bill and Barry went barhopping, but Zoe, Jay, Jake, Katie and I went to a park. Jay had an idea for a scene, and he’s all excited. He thinks you’re going to like it.”
“I probably will. He’s good.”
She was still searching out his eyes. He smiled and kissed her lips. She drew the covers more tightly around her and she frowned, trying to understand her sudden reticence with him.
She let out a deep, pent-up breath. “Sean, I saw Carlos Roca.”
“What?” He sat up, staring at her, trying to fathom her eyes in the shadows.
“Actually, I had just thought that I’d seen Carlos, but…Bartholomew was with us, following us, and he said that it was Carlos Roca.”
“So the man has been hiding in Miami,” Sean said, “hiding in plain sight.” He started to rise.
“Sean, wait. Where are you going?” she asked.
“To notify the authorities,” he said.
“But what if he’s in hiding—because he’s innocent?” Vanessa asked.
“Vanessa, if he’s innocent, he’ll be able to prove it.”
“How? We both know that he looks guilty as hell, and that innocent men do go to prison,” she argued.
He stared down at her and shook his head sadly. “Vanessa, I have to notify the authorities. If he’s been living here—”
“He hasn’t been living here,” she said.
“What? How do you know? Did he accost you?” he asked, coming down beside her again, drawing her to him. “Did he hurt you, did he threaten you, did—”
“No, no, no. I never got close to him. But he was in Key West.”
He eased away, trying to study her face again. “You saw him in Key West, and you didn’t tell me?” he asked her.
“I didn’t know that I had seen him. I thought that I might have seen him,” she said. “But then, God knows what I see anymore!”
“So he is following you,” Sean said.
“I don’t know that. And if he is, I swear, I think it’s because he needs help.”
“Vanessa, what happened to the trust thing that was supposed to be going on between us?” he asked her softly.
“I do trust you. I just know how you feel.”
He nodded slowly. “You wouldn’t have told me now—except that Bartholomew saw him, too.”
“Your ghost,” she reminded him dryly.
He stood. He reached for his jeans again. “Sean—”
“Vanessa, I’m really sorry. The authorities have to know,” he told her. He walked to the deck. Ted was leaning back on the aft cushions, watching the stars—and the dock.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“A Carlos Roca sighting,” he said. “I’m going up to radio the Coast Guard and let the police know that the man was seen in Miami.”
“Roca?” Ted sat up straight. “Do you think… Wow. Do you think he’ll come after the rest of that crew?”
“Ted, we’re traveling the way we are just to make sure we don’t have trouble and that no one can take us by surprise. But if you’re worried about you and Jaden, I can leave you here and you can get a rental car to take home.”
“No. No,” Ted told him. “We’re on this. We’ve discussed it. We’re with you all the way. And I’m ready. Trust me. I’m ready.” He showed Sean that he had a speargun down by his side. “I know how to use this faster than a winking eye, and you know it.”
Sean nodded. “Yeah, I know.”
He radioed the Coast Guard first, and then called the police, and then David. Bartholomew was seated in the companion seat, aware of Ted just below.
“She told you,” Bartholomew said.
Sean nodded.
Bartholomew looked out at the water, at the various boats docked at the public marina. “You had to know,” he said.
“Yep.”
“I’ll be on deck,” Bartholomew said.
Sean smiled. “Thanks.”
He went back down, telling Ted that he’d spell him in three hours.
He went back to his cabin.
Vanessa’s eyes were closed. He didn’t think that she was sleeping, but he lay down beside her without touching her.
A moment later she spoke in the darkness. “You called the police?”
“Yes.”
She was silent, staying on her own side of the bed. He didn’t press the matter. He had done what he had to do, even if he understood that the man had been her friend and she believed in him.
But everyone on that island had been her friend. She trusted them all.
And the more he thought about it all, the more he learned, Sean didn’t believe that there had been someone in a boat who had slipped onto the island, killed Travis, gone after Carlos Roca and Georgia, killed Georgia, dismembered two bodies, and escaped with the boat and Carlos Roca, who was now miraculously alive and well.
That was too suspect.
Someone in that film crew had been guilty. Someone knew more than they were saying. And with the violence and brutality of the murders, he doubted that it was someone who had killed only once, for a purpose. That someone had killed before, had probably killed again, and would keep killing. It seemed likely that maybe that person was involved in a murder conspiracy with Carlos Roca.
“I’m sorry,” Sean said.
“So am I,” she said.
He smiled. “Are you sorry that I called the police—or sorry that you didn’t tell me earlier?”
“Both,” she said after a moment.
He rolled toward her and reached for her, pulling her into his arms. “Please understand. It’s a dangerous world out there,” he said softly.
“I know,” she told him gravely.
He nodded. He wasn’t sure what else to say. He kissed her. And then he knew that he’d have to leave soon enough, take his turn on guard duty.
He made love to her, slowly, tenderly, and she responded, making love in turn, her kisses gentle, her whispers soft…her movement fluid. They winced together at one point—it was a boat, and they were trying to be quiet, and they were, but…
They lay together afterward, and the boat rocked gently, and he heard a distant bell.
“I don’t think that it will matter that I called the Miami police,” he told her.
“Why not?”
“Because I think he’s already out there. Carlos Roca knows where we’re going, he knows our route, and he knows we’re headed for Haunt Island.
“And he’s already on his way.”
14
“Let’s head straight on over, set up camp on the island and work backward from there,” Sean suggested. He and David had met at the breakfast bar near the marina. He opened the book he kept on their schedule with relevant sea charts and maps. “We’re clear with the Bahamian authorities, and I started doing calculations on what I could find regarding the current at the time, the time of year and the storm—and I think that once the pirate ship started to take on water and break up during the storm, it would have been forced out of the deep water where it was always assumed to have sunk, and that the debris field would stretch out not far from the first drop-off to the southwest of Haunt Island.”
“I like the logic of getting there, setting up a base and moving on from Haunt Island,” David said. “You like the split that we have of people? Yesterday was the first time it seemed you didn’t trust everyone with us.”
“I don’t. I don’t trust anyone right now.”
“Especially Carlos Roca? And you really think that Vanessa saw him—and that it was him?”
Sean shrugged, looking toward the marina. “There are just so many factors in this situation that make no sense. I’m going to try to get Vanessa to take me through it all again, step by step, from earlier in the afternoon before Georgia Dare came running down the beach. The thing is, I don’t think that one person could have done all this. I think that if Carlos was guilty, he had to have had an accomplice. If he wasn’t guilty, two people had to be involved. Yes, it’s possible that there was a boat at anchor near the island that was hidden from view behind palms or foliage or even the curve of the shoreline. But the thing is—why? Don’t you think that someone must have had a reason—no matter how psychotic—to butcher bodies and leave them on display?”