Page 21 of On the Line

I didn’t like the plan one bit, but thankfully it would be my last trip.

Anxious to get it over with, I volunteered. “I’ll go first.” Peeking out the companionway, I slowly climbed the steps to the back deck. My heart pounded as I glanced left and right through the plexiglass window. No one in sight. I slid the wooden door open and stepped from the Hatteras to the dock, hightailing it to Johnny B’s Mako two slips over as casually as one can while questioning every bad decisionthey ever made, lugging a ridiculously heavy sack of cash. If it got me out of this life, it was worth it.

The Mako started right up. Stowing the duffel under the seat, I quickly untied the lines and navigated out of the marina.My racing heart started to calm once I left the shallows for the channel and got up to speed. With the wind buffeting my hair and my wake spread out behind me, I navigated the twists and turns until the bridge came into sight. I slowed just enough to pass beneath the light marking the safe channel in the center, then I cranked it up again. I really wished I was in my truck instead, driving over that bridge and heading to Ellie’s aunt’s house in Tavernier, with all this behind me. Soon.

I pushed the throttle forward again, the 28-foot center console slicing through the water even faster. The Mako was exactly the kind of boat I needed. Johnny B had good taste. A chill ran through me at the thought that he wasn’t going to be needing it in prison.

The light on Alligator Reef came into view, the lens rotating and emitting a flash every five seconds. My breath quickened as I aimed directly for it. I knew the depths around the lighthouse as well as I knew the backcountry in the Bay. The 136-foot iron structure stood four miles east of Indian Key, and had great fishing. They built it in just a few feet of water, to warn of the shallows of the reef where so many ships had run aground. But just past the lighthouse, the reef dropped off dramatically, which is where George had marked the charts for me to drop the buoy.

My sweaty palms gripped the wheel as I glanced down at the package at my feet. This was definitely the riskiest job I’d ever done. Bootleg champagne was the only contraband I’d ever actually touched for George. There wasn’t a deputydown here that would do anything other than take a bottle for himself and send me home with an admonishment to not do it again. But this? They’d bury me under the jail for this.

All of a sudden, the radio lit up. “Hey Johnny,” George’s raspy voice squawked through the VHF. “Aunt B really wanted gator, but she’s not gonna make it home tonight. She says she’ll see you the next time she comes to the marina.” I reflexively pulled the throttle back, the boat bucking as it slowed and sank into its own wake.

What the hell?

Johnny was in jail. I was in his boat. George had to be talking to me.But what did he mean?I tried to connect the dots.Gator… did that have to do with the lighthouse?Not gonna make it home tonight?Did he mean I couldn’t go back to the marina?

As if sensing my confusion, George’s voice came across the VHF again. “On her way out she said weather is coming. It's gonna be hot at the marina tonight and you should have fixed the AC.”

Wait? Hot at the marina? Cops???FUCK!

The Mako bobbed erratically, the wind and current battling for control, while I tried to figure out what to do.

Should I drop the package?

I realized my hand was trembling when I pushed the button on the VHF and I had to steady my thumb with the other hand. Somehow I managed to say, “I’ll fix the AC, but should I cook the gator anyway?” But what I was thinking was:Fuck!I was still at least a mile off the lighthouse, with a duffel bag full of cash that I wanted to get rid of immediately. But not if the site was compromised.

“No, no, skip the gator,” George said, his voice frantic. “Too hot to cook. Hole up at Stark’s till the storm passes.” Sirens wailed in the background for the final second before the radio fell silent.

I didn’t dare reply, but I had no idea what the hell I was supposed to do now. There was normally a contingency plan. If drops got hot, they had a Plan B. That was the whole point of our normal elaborate set up of multiple potential drop sites and multiple spotters. George barely told us about Plan A before rushing us off to this shit show. I floated there for a couple of minutes, wishing I could chuck the duffel bag overboard and speed off into the darkness in my dream boat.

My heart sped, threatening to come out of my chest at the sound of a motor nearby. The boat approaching had no lights. As it got close, a voice called, “Ahoy, asshole!”

I finally let out my breath when I recognized Waylan on the fast boat. “Fuck, man. You scared the shit out of me.”

“Well, change your drawers,” Waylan said, rafting the speed boat up to the Mako. “We have to figure out what that shit means.”

He was as confused as I was by George’s cryptic message, but I hoped he had some inkling. “Any idea what the hell is happening?”

“No clue,” Waylan said, an urgent tremble in his voice, “but it doesn’t sound good.”

The silence as we floated, thinking, was like a void needing answers. The sky was so clear I could see the Milky Way spread out above us.It would have been beautiful if I wasn’t scared half to death.

Mulling over George’s words on the radio, I had a thought. “He said ‘hole up at Stark’s until the storm passes.’ You think that means leave the boats in the hurricane hole?” When a big storm was coming, fishermen tied up their big boats there, deep in the mangroves of an inlet on the west side of Lignumvitae Key.

“Hmm. That’s pretty smart thinking, Slick,” Waylan grinned. “Makes sense. Go stash these boats there and lay low?”

That didn’t address the duffel issue, though. “What about the money?”

“I guess we’ll figure it out when we get there. I’m guessing Mateo will meet us at Stark’s…? I mean, George said Stark’s. Even Mateo should get that clue. Then it'll be his problem.”

“Damn it!” I groaned. “I wish I could ditch it now. This is risky as shit.” I didn’t want to be caught in convicted Johnny B’s boat with that bag of cash.

“And telling George that we threw his money in the ocean, that’s less risky?” Waylan asked.

“No.” I thought about all the ways we could be fucked. “You think he got arrested?”

“I heard sirens,” Waylan said with a worried look.

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