Page 78 of Building Courage

He drew a breath. “No, you have to use a compass underwater to keep your bearings so you don’t get lost. You radiate out from a fixed point and then back again. You’ll have a backup team with you on your dive, but you’ll need to be your own backup, just in case.” He didn’t even want to go into her being in the southern hemisphere and how the compass would be calibrated differently. Or that dive compasses were a little different. One step at a time.

“Can we go again?” she asked.

“How ’bout we go to the park where we first met, and we’ll practice there?”

He was relieved when a brief smile peaked out. “Okay.”

“One minute. I’ll get my car keys and wallet.” He jogged to the front door, unlocked it, and went inside. He was smiling before he ever got to his bedroom. He opened the top drawer of the dresser and withdrew a small rectangular box. He didn’t know why he’d saved all the flotsam from his childhood years, but he had the perfect thing for Brynn.

He returned to the front yard with the car keys in hand. She’d moved to the car. He hit the unlock button on the fob, and she opened the door to get in. Once they were in the car, he paused before starting the engine.

“I have something for you.” He reached for her hand and slid a ring on her finger.

She looked down at the ring, studied the plastic dome-shaped setting, and laughed.

“I thought you could use a reward for making it back to the house.”

She laughed. “How long have you had this?”

“Since fourth grade. It’s adjustable.”

She laughed. “You were a cub scout?”

“Yeah. My dad was our troop leader. He handed them out to the pack when we did the compass training. He was big into hunting and camping and didn’t want any of us to get lost in the woods.”

The smile still lingered on her lips. “Thank you, Tucker. I’ll take good care of it.”

*

Morning came too quickly. It felt strange to pack her bag and load her camera and computer. She kissed Tucker goodbye, which sparked more than she had time for. As she headed down the coast to the next shoot she’d scheduled, she glanced at her flushed face in the rearview mirror and grinned. A real estate office had hired her to do a spread on one of the large mansions along the coast they’d just put on the market. She spent two hours at the mansion the real estate office had hired her to photograph, downloaded the pictures onto her laptop on site to view them, and then forwarded them to the office for their okay. Twenty minutes after sending the images, she received her payment online and was on her way home.

Once there, Brynn sat at the desk and printed off the photo order Liam Bryant had sent her. The suspicion that he might be a part of whatever business was being conducted on the Titan had tainted her feelings toward him. It was hard not to believe he didn’t have some kind of connection to the Titan or that he wasn’t aware of what the men were doing.

Once she delivered the photos, her business with him would be concluded. She’d be relieved to put their association behind her.

She slid the large photos into a twelve-by-eighteen box and secured the lid with tape. She also secured the itemized receipt with the final tally for the work she’d done for him on the lid. It was a large order that would pay her rent for the month and then some.

She moved on to print out the pictures of the cabin cruiser and the two men on board with the woman. She studied the shots. Why had they come so close to shore? Every time she looked at the pictures, it triggered feelings she’d tried hard to leave behind.

She hoped Ahmad was keeping his distance and staying safe. She intended to do so as soon as she delivered the pictures to Liam Bryant and got her check.

She studied the pictures she’d worked so hard to enlarge and sharpen. They might not be anything, but she felt they were. She’d drop them off at the police station on her way to Bryant’s. She slipped the photos into a manila envelope and sealed it.

She looked up the address for the police station and texted it to herself to program into her GPS in the car.

She paused to look at the compass ring Tucker had slipped on her finger. She needed to tell him what she’d done and what she planned to do with the photos. She scanned her recent calls and hit his temporary number. The call went to voice mail. She left a message that she’d recovered some photos of the Titan from her computer that were more incriminating and was going to the police station to drop them off.

She searched the web for information about the detective involved in the case so she’d know whose name to put on the front of the envelope, but she found no information.

She did find a phone number to report a crime or ask for information. Her hands trembled as she dialed the number.

“San Diego Police Department Hotline,” a female voice announced. “How can I help you?”

“Could you tell me the name of the detective who’s investigating the death of the drowning victim discovered on the beach eight days ago?”

“That would be Detective Javier Hernandez. Would you like to be connected to him?”

“No. I just needed his name. Thank you.”

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