Backwater Tide Page 4

  I had discovered a strange phenomenon during my time here: though I hadn’t confirmed it, I suspected that all boat owners had some kind of built-in radar about their vessels. While boats and cars both got you from one place to another, they were totally different animals. Once you parked and locked a car, it would take an experienced thief to break in or steal it. But with a boat, there were tides, currents, storms, lines, and a myriad of other factors that affected it at dock. Over the last year, something in my subconscious had woken me several times in the middle of the night, alerting me to check the boat. Each time there had been an adjustment needed or a problem to be addressed.

  I had the same feeling now. Knowing sleep was not coming, I slid from the bed, careful not to wake Justine. Out on the porch, which overlooked the dock, I could see a dim light coming from the wheelhouse of the Reale. My first thought was that there was a good chance when I’d been trying to familiarize myself with the controls of the boat, I had inadvertently flipped a switch. The daylight would have prevented me from seeing the light was on. That theory went out the window when I saw a shape pass in front of it.

  After retrieving my mag light and weapon from inside, I slipped into my flip-flops and eased open the screen door. It gave its usual squeak as it closed and I froze in place until I was sure it hadn’t been noticed. One at a time, I took the stairs down to the walk, careful to put my weight on the outside of the treads where they were less likely to make noise. On reaching the concrete walkway, I paused again. There was still no indication that I had been spotted and I scanned the dock to see if there were any strange boats nearby. Unless they had tied off to the outside of the treasure boat, I couldn’t see an intruder, and when the shape moved again I saw the profile. I had no doubt it was Ray.

  I didn’t want a confrontation with my only neighbor, but I had to see what he was doing. If we were going to have a face-to-face, I might as well let him know I was here. I knew he had at least a rifle and sneaking up on him might prove fatal.

  “Hey,” I called out softly as I approached the dock. I saw a shadow cross the light again and a second later Ray appeared on the deck.

  “Just making sure she was secure,” he said.

  Standing with his hands on his hips, his body language told me otherwise. “I had the same feeling. Did you check the lines?”

  “All good.” He went back into the wheelhouse and shut off the light, then reappeared on deck. “Think I’ll head back up to bed.”

  We exchanged wary glances as he passed me on the walkway. “Think I’ll have a look as well.”

  There was no point in waiting for him to disappear into his house; I suspected he would be watching me. As badly as I wanted to go into the wheelhouse and see if there was any evidence of what he had been doing, I casually checked the cleats to make sure the lines were secure, then after adjusting the spring line—though it didn’t need it—I hopped down to the deck. I glanced back at Ray’s house and noticed that most of the boat would be obstructed from his view. He would see a light, but as long as it stayed dark, he couldn’t see what I was up to.

  It was a dark night with only a crescent moon above. A security light on the dock cast a shadow but did little to illuminate the deck. I wondered if the surveillance camera Martinez had mounted above the pole had night vision. Viewing the video to see what Ray had been doing would require either a stealth operation to get into his office or having to ask him outright. Neither option appealed to me.

  Staying in the shadows, I moved toward the wheelhouse and entered the dark space. Looking around at the instruments, I tried to figure out what Ray had been doing. It didn’t take long when I saw the GPS unit mounted above the dashboard. In the treasure hunting and salvage world, those numbers were invaluable. Tomorrow, before we did anything else, I would check the unit.

  Ray was someone I knew and trusted, but seeing how his behavior had changed when the word treasure was used and when he had seen the glint of silver put me on high alert. He wouldn’t be the only one, either. Once the media ran the story and found out where the boat was docked, I expected visitors.

  I left the boat and walked back to the house. It was quiet when I entered, but I knew sleep was not coming quickly. Unplugging my laptop from the charger, I sat on the couch and started Googling anything that might help me understand what Gross would have been after.

  An hour later, my eyes were starting to close. As can be the case with the internet, there was too much information: forums, articles, and books flooded my search results. After looking, bleary-eyed, at my pages of random notes, I hoped that the GPS would tell me more in the morning and went back to bed.

  Six

  I woke Sunday morning to the smell of pancakes. The sound of Justine and Allie talking in the kitchen bled through the walls, above the background noise of what I guessed was the TV. Sunlight streamed in through the edges of the blackout shades I had recently installed at Justine’s request. We were still adjusting to our two-home lifestyle and I wanted to do anything that would make her more comfortable here. I had to admit planning our new life had been fun, and as I listened to the hum of conversation, I lay there happy. Then, groggy from lack of sleep, I slowly climbed out of bed and dressed in cargo shorts and a t-shirt. My standard Sunday wear was not that much different from my day-to-day uniform of khaki shorts and a park service polo. After throwing some water on my face, I brushed my teeth and headed out for some food and coffee.

  The girls had breakfast ready and I eagerly dug in. Allie wanted to know what we had planned and I searched my brain for a half-day activity that would end by three, when we would need to leave to get her home on time.

  I had quickly learned that one of the keys to a stable relationship with my ex was to be timely for exchanges. Monday through Friday Allie lived with her mom, an arrangement I had agreed to for my daughter’s benefit. Stability was important, especially for a teenager, and though I missed some milestones of her growing up, it was the best thing for her.

  “What do you guys want to do?”

  “Justine said I could help her process the rest of the boat,” Allie said.

  I looked over at Justine, who nodded and then glanced out the window. You didn’t need a degree in meteorology to forecast the weather here. Described as seven months of summer and five months of hell, what we were currently in might be considered purgatory. October had as equal a chance of tropical weather as cold fronts, but as the year faded into November, the tropics cooled down and the cold fronts became stronger. It was rare for one to reach this far south and even when it did, it was generally mild. December and January brought those dreaded fifty-degree days when the down coats, hats, and gloves came out.

  A light breeze rustled the palm trees. From their movement I gauged the wind at five to ten miles per hour from the southeast—a typical early fall day. “It looks pretty good out there. You sure you don’t want to go fish or something?” I was making every effort not to sabotage what was turning out to be the best time in my life by letting work interfere.

  “I really want to help,” Allie said, making things easier.

  “If you’re sure. Maybe if you guys finish we can try and find that school of juvenile tarpon that’s been hanging around.” Chico, one of the local guides I had befriended, had turned me on to the spot across Caesar Creek, where the school hung out on the falling tide. My experience out west had been fly-fishing the streams, but lately I had been converted to spinning gear, mostly for the ease and ability to fish deep enough for the snapper and grouper that were plentiful here if you knew where to look. Tarpon was a catch-and-release fish, and I had been teaching Allie and Justine how to fly-fish for them. Even though you couldn’t eat them, the blazing runs and jumps of the ten to fifteen-pound fish made them fun to catch.

  I’d made my offer, and if CSI was what they wanted to do I was all for it. I was also getting anxious about who else might be looking for the Reale. My fears turned the corner to reality when I saw a picture of the same boat we
had docked outside on the TV screen.

  “Hold on,” I said, going for the remote. The three of us stared at the screen.

  ”Treasure hunter Gill Gross was found dead aboard his boat the Reale yesterday,” the on-screen reporter said. The screen changed to show a group of people around another boat with a mailbox attached to its stern. The similarities ended there. This one was at least twice the size of Gross’s boat and looked much newer. ”We’re here with several of Gross’s friends. Let’s get their reaction.” The reporter approached a man. From a glimpse of his body language, I could tell he held himself in high regard. He puffed out his chest and I thought he might have done a tippy-toe rise to appear larger. ”With me is one of Gross’s contemporaries, Vince Bugarra.”

  It was clear after listening to the interviews that the media didn’t have much information. But that was likely to change. I could only hope that Martinez had an early tee time and hadn’t seen the news.

  “This might be our last shot at that boat without having the media and who knows who else looking over our shoulders,” Justine said.

  “Okay.” I wanted to have a look at the electronics anyway. “While you guys do your thing, I think I’ll try and download the GPS data and see if we can figure out where he was.”

  “Really,” Justine said in surprise. “Thought that up all by yourself? I must be rubbing off on you.” She reached over and punched my arm.

  I hadn’t told her about Ray’s visit to the boat last night and didn’t plan on it, at least while Allie was around. It was Ray’s interest that had given me the idea. Moving to the junk drawer by the refrigerator I pulled a bundle of tangled cables out and set them on the counter, then with my laptop in hand, I grabbed the pile and headed out the door.

  I had decided not to confront Ray about his clandestine visit before at least looking at the data. When I saw that his boat was gone, the point appeared to be moot. I could only hope he wasn’t heading for trouble. Then again, knowing Ray, he could just as easily be out fishing, checking his lobster traps, or setting his stone crab traps. Looking at my watch, I saw it was the fifteenth, stone crab opening day. Storms had turned last year’s season into a disaster, but I had been around the water long enough to know that conditions could change on a dime. There had been a lot of talk amongst the commercial guys about scaling back their operations or not setting traps at all this year, but I knew they would. You weren’t going to win if you didn’t enter.

  It was actually a relief that he was gone and I dropped down to the deck of the boat and brought my laptop and the bundle of cables into the wheelhouse. I wasn’t the park IT guy, but I knew my way around computers and electronics, so hooking up the computer to the GPS was well within my skill set. After studying the unit, I saw I was halfway there without even plugging in and reached to open a small cover where a micro SD card could be inserted. It was empty. My thoughts turned to Ray and I wondered if he had taken it. The benefit of the doubt I’d been giving him would be revoked if he had.

  The GPS on the park service boats was simpler than the unit aboard the Reale, but the concept was the same. Pressing the power button, I waited for the unit to acquire the satellite signals and started scrolling through the screens. Allie and Justine had come on board now, but I ignored them as I familiarized myself with the unit.

  I already knew that the SD card was not the entire memory, just a supplement. After finding the waypoints page, I scrolled through the screen, finding over a hundred points. To export them to my computer I would need to connect to the unit, so I searched through the cables to find one that would fit. Several times I was frustrated, but I finally found it. Now I had to export the data.

  Scrolling to the data screen, I found the export to KML option and touched the screen to select it. Touchscreens were fairly new on marine GPSs and I got a little equipment envy when I saw how much faster they worked than the one aboard my center console. The computers acknowledged each other and the data was soon confirmed on my laptop.

  The numbers on the unit were a shot in the dark. Fishermen were notorious for guarding their hard-earned numbers; with what was at stake, I had to assume treasure hunters were even more hardcore. I expected that the numbers stored on the machine were mostly public marinas and reefs; all available on the internet.

  Before long I had everything I could get from the GPS and decided that the temptation was too great to leave the unit aboard. After unscrewing it from the base, I removed the wires in the back and set it with the laptop. Justine and Allie were still working on the deck and I noticed the dive gear still where I had found it yesterday.

  “Can we look at the gear?” I asked.

  “I’d like to have a quick look, but if it was used yesterday, the saltwater probably erased any evidence,” Justine said.

  This brought my thinking back to the cause of death. Sid worked weekends and I pulled out my phone and texted him. Hopefully he would postpone the autopsy until we had dropped off Allie. I would have rather sat on the couch and watched football, but with the publicity this case was already garnering I wanted to make sure I was there.

  He answered that he would wait and start at four. I replied that we would be there. There was no need to ask Justine. My new wife had a preference for the dead over the living. I looked back toward them; they were working the area where the concretions were. I watched Allie squat and use a pair of tweezers to place the small chips in an evidence bag.

  Justine rose and walked toward the gear. I allowed her space, knowing she hated to have anyone looking over her shoulder. She was an experienced diver and knew her way around the equipment better than I did, so I stood back and watched.

  After taking a slew of pictures and making a thorough visual inspection, she checked her gloves and reached for the regulator. Pressing the purge button did nothing. Next she checked the air gauge and the tank valve.

  “Empty.”

  “We’ve been there; that’s not that unusual.” I was an air hog, especially compared to Justine. We all knew it was bad practice, but on several shallow water dives where the boat had been visible and directly above us, I had pushed the envelope and run out of air trying to extend the bottom time.

  “There’s no indication that anyone was with him.” She looked at the empty tank racks.

  I looked at the yellow and green band around the tank that labeled it as suitable for NITROX. The oxygen-rich mix helped extend bottom time. There was always the chance he had gotten a bad mix, but with an empty tank there was no way to prove it. The cause of death would have to wait for Sid’s determination.

  “You guys about done?” I asked, looking at my watch. Commuting from an island involved more than traffic. With the weather holding and the seas down, I expected the run to headquarters would take about twenty minutes. Then Miami traffic would come into play. We needed to leave in about a half hour to allow enough of a cushion to meet Allie’s mom on time. I went back to the wheelhouse and grabbed my computer and the GPS unit.

  “Where you going with that?” Justine asked.

  “Just removing temptation. I’ll give it to the next of kin.”

  “It should be dusted for prints.”

  Pretending to fumble with the unit, I rubbed the screen against my shirt. As a federal employee, Ray would have his prints on file. As the last person besides me to touch the unit, his name would turn up if she ran them. Still not sure what to do with him, as his neighbor and friend I decided to protect him. I shrugged, promising myself to tell her later about his late-night visit.

  Seven

  Though it’s not listed on Yelp, if you want a surefire remedy for the South Florida heat and humidity, I can recommend the coldest place in town. Because of the high water table and storm surges most buildings here are built on fill, but the Miami-Dade Medical Examiner’s office is located in one of the only basements in Dade County. Looking down at the body, I shivered from the cool air blowing on the back of my neck from the oversized ventilation system. The sterile room, w
ith tiled walls and floor and stainless steel everything else, did little to provide any warmth. I felt goose bumps on my arms as I stood on the far side of the table watching Sid and Justine examine the body.

  I’d been lucky so far with the few autopsies I had attended. My first cases had involved bodies that had been in the water. The longer the saltwater and sea life had to attack the body, the more clinical it appeared on the table. In comparison, Gill Gross looked fresh, although there were some signs of his death. His skin, which I remembered as having the deep tan of someone who spent his life outdoors, had turned a pallid grey overnight. Now, more than twenty-four hours after his death his muscles had slackened to the point that he looked like a rag doll. In layman terms he was no longer a stiff.

  Sid was just about done with the anterior inspection.

  “Think you can help us roll him?” he called across to me.

  In many police departments investigators are required to attend the autopsy. In my three-person office there was no such rule and no chance Martinez or Susan McLeash would ever cross the threshold of the sterile room. As much as I didn’t care to be here either, I had learned the value of observation. The medical examiner’s priorities were to identify the deceased and find the cause of death. They often overlooked things that could lead to the killer. There were of course detailed reports, but reading through the mundane verbiage it was easy to miss details.

  Unlike many investigators, who never looked forward to being present at an autopsy, Justine could do this every day. She eagerly assisted Sid whenever she could. The old Jersey transplant had been doing this since Justine and I had been in diapers, and though forensics had changed drastically over those years, a dead body was still a dead body, and Sid knew his way around one.

  I moved to the other side of the table and helped them roll Gross’s body. Sid started his observations at the top of the scalp and moved down through the body, noting every detail as he went. I soon tired of the monotone dictation and started looking ahead. Unfortunately, I saw nothing that was going to get me out of the internal portion of the procedure that was soon to follow.