I’m not sure how long we sat there. It probably wasn’t very long, but it felt like a couple of hours. My mind was far away, out over the ocean, trying to get to a small freighter. It couldn’t be that far out. Not more than ten miles. If it was on land, I could run it down in an hour or two.
But it wasn’t on land. It was on the ocean. There were no roads, no paths, nothing to follow and nothing to run on.
And no way to get out there. No way to find the freighter even if I did get out there.
As my mind circled around the same thing for the thousandth time, I felt the silence in the car. I looked around. They were all looking at me.
Ray put an arm across the back of the seat. “Well,” he said weakly. “I guess I just fucked up.” He looked away, out over the water. “I’m sorry, Billy.”
“Not your fault,” The Deacon said. “Let’s get back.”
“Can you get a chopper?” I asked Deacon.
“Son, I know this is rough on you. But we have no actual proof that a crime has been committed—”
“You know damn well—”
“Now, hear me out, buddy. I’m talking proof in the legal sense, which you and I know’s got nothing to do with what really happened. But a chopper is going to cost the department thousands of dollars. And from a budgeting standpoint they’re going to need that kind of proof—not just that she’s out there, but enough proof to get a conviction, before they commit to that kind of money.”
“For God’s sake.” I felt like the world was unraveling.
“I will ask them. I will call in every favor I got laying around out there. But I don’t want you thinking this is gonna solve the problem, because smart money says it won’t.”
“She’s out there. You know she is.”
“Yes, I do know. But it’s not my chopper.”
Ray put the car in gear.
Instead of calling it in, Deacon thought he’d have a better chance asking for the helicopter face to face. But even at high speed it was twenty minutes before we got back to Deacon’s office. Figure a speed of around ten knots. Maybe a little less. The ship would be another three or four miles away.
Nicky and I sat in Deacon’s office while he ran up and down the hall trying to find the right string to pull. Nicky was unnaturally quiet. Maybe he was blaming himself. He’d opened the door and let Hell in. I guessed he was telling himself he hadn’t been strong enough, or quick enough, or man enough. I wished I could blame him, too. Anger would have been a lot better than the dead misery I was feeling.
Deacon was back in twenty minutes. Another three or four miles. I didn’t need to ask how it had gone. It was right there on his face.
“I’m sorry, buddy,” he said.
I stood up. “I need a boat,” I said.
“It’s going to be the same answer,” he told me. “They’re just not convinced down there. Say it’s too complicated, what with no clear and compelling evidence of a crime, international waters screwing up the jurisdiction—I’m sorry, buddy,” he said again. “But they’d rather let this one slip away than ruffle feathers in Tallahassee.”
“Get me out of here,” I told him, and I started for the door. “Take me back to my car.” I would find a boat. I didn’t know where, and I was sure it would be too late, but I’d do it.
Nicky followed me out the door, looking grim and indignant, and Deacon came behind.
As we drove back to my car I tried to think of all the options. It was pretty easy. There weren’t any. Rent a boat? Not the boat I needed, with the big fuel tanks and the kind of speed and equipment to catch the freighter. Steal a boat? And get caught, flung back in jail, seal Anna’s fate for sure?
I looked out the window. It was still Miami out there. Beautiful, angry, uncaring Miami. Paradise lost. There were no boats waiting on the street corners. I couldn’t go into that mall we were passing and put a boat on my credit card. And I couldn’t—
“Stop the car,” I said.
Deacon nosed into the curb and stepped on the brake, turning to me with a rais
ed eyebrow.
“The mall,” I said. I closed my eyes and tried not to breathe too hard. For the first time in hours I could feel my heart turning over, the blood moving through me, into my hands, all the way down into my toes.
“I see it, buddy,” Deacon said patiently.