Ghost Ship (NUMA Files 12)

He turned to El Din, who stood at the helm. “We’re still falling back. Can’t you goose any more speed out of this lobster boat?”

“Patience,” El Din said. “Remember, patience may be bitter, but its result is sweet.”

Joe cut his eyes at El Din. “I’m not interested in learning patience. Just keeping that yacht in sight.”

Without warning, the tracking scanner began to chirp. “It’s the beacon. He’s in the water.”

“Thank Allah,” El Din said. He shoved the throttles full on to the stops, hoping for more speed than the boat possessed.

“What happened to all that ‘patience’?” Joe asked.

“I was never very good at it,” El Din said. “Besides, the time for patience is over. Now is the time for action.”

Joe could not agree more. Kurt had been aboard the Massif for just under an hour, but it felt like half the night. He placed the scanner down and raised the spotter’s scope up to his eye. Almost immediately he saw something he didn’t like.

“Damn.”

“What is it?”

“The yacht’s turning broadside,” Joe said. “They’re coming back around.”

The Massif turned in a wide arc, shedding velocity as it went. By the time its rudder was back on center, the huge vessel was making no more than five knots.

Standing on the bridge, Acosta marked a spot on the GPS map where the stowaway had gone overboard.

“Hold this speed and keep the ship stable,” he ordered. “I want you to make slow passes back and forth through this area until we spot and kill the intruder.”

“Yes, sir,” the captain said. He didn’t bat an eye at the brutal order.

With that done, Acosta stepped out on the deck. Caleb waited there holding a bolt-action hunter’s rifle. “Give me that,” Acosta said. “You might miss again.”

Caleb scowled and handed the rifle to his master.

In addition to his own hand, Acosta had stationed teams of armed men at various spots on the main deck. Two groups stood amidships, one on each side. Two more men waited at the stern.

“Lights to full,” Acosta ordered.

/> Around them exterior lights lit up the waters of the Persian Gulf in a swath two hundred feet wide and five hundred feet long. Two spotlights above the bridge came on and were aimed ahead and outward at forty-five-degree angles in order to cover the most water possible.

“This won’t take long,” Acosta promised, wrapping the rifle’s strap around his forearm.

“Target off the starboard beam,” someone shouted.

Acosta was on the port side. He strode back through the bridge and pushed out through the starboard door just as his men opened fire. Ribbons of water flew up where the men laced bullets into the fire zone.

Acosta raised his weapon and spotted the target quickly: a flash of white clothing. He fired once—a direct hit. The coveralls jerked as the bullet found its mark, but there was no blood or even the slightest defensive reaction.

As the target drifted closer, Acosta saw why. The stolen coveralls were empty. They floated past in a tangle, sliding gently across the waves.

More shots rang out.

“Hold your fire!” Acosta shouted. “There’s no one there. He must have shed the clothing and left them behind as a decoy.”

The shooting ceased, and Acosta turned his attention back toward the inscrutable waters, looking for any sign of the man who’d come aboard his yacht.

After several minutes with nothing to see, he lost his patience. “Take us back around,” he bellowed. “He has to be out here somewhere.”

In fact, Kurt was much closer than Acosta could have guessed. He was clinging to the side of the ship, twenty feet below the main deck, about six feet from the rushing water.