Gale Force

90

Early the next morning, McKenna Rhodes stood at her tug’s wheel, plotting a course through the Aleutian Islands as the Gale Force’s mighty engines pulled the Pacific Lion away from her moorings in Unalaska Bay.

Dutch Harbor lay behind the big freighter, fading into the fog. The airport was closed again. Even if McKenna had wanted Harrington back, she couldn’t have him. She still wasn’t sure she’d made the right decision sending him away.

Working at sea was a lonely business. For the most part, McKenna could handle the loneliness when she was working, when there was a job and a rhythm and a simplicity to life: the tug, and the tow, and the ocean beyond. It was harder on dry land, when the grocery stores and streets and sidewalks were filled with happy couples, romantic movies, love songs. It was easier to take refuge out on the water, easiest to just shut yourself off from romance completely.

She’d had a long, sleepless night to think about the architect, to remember the strength in his arms as he’d held her, the wry humor behind those eyes. Now, in the morning, she was tired of feeling heartsick. Tired of longing for a man who’d already kicked her aside once, for a life she damn well knew was impossible. She had a job to do, a ten-day tow worth another half a million dollars, easy—and it would be easy, compared to the challenge of saving the Lion in the first place.

Behind the Lion, the Coast Guard cutter Munro idled away from her dock. The cutter would tail the Gale Force up and out of Unalaska Bay, and back down through busy Unimak Pass, between Unimak and Akun Islands, just east of Unalaska. The pass saw more than three thousand freighters a year traversing the Great Circle Route between Asia and the Pacific Coast of North America. Things weren’t liable to get near as hairy as in Samalga Pass, but Captain Geoffries on the Munro wanted to see the Pacific Lion safely across to the North Pacific before he let McKenna on her way.

McKenna didn’t mind. If she were honest, she appreciated the support. The waters around the Aleutian Islands were tricky and treacherous, and given the Lion’s history, it couldn’t hurt to have someone around who knew the local currents.

The crew was mostly down below. Jason Parent cooked breakfast. Al Parent was asleep, resting for his wheel watch. Ridley was in the engine room, and Matt and Stacey Jonas had returned to the Lion, camping out on board the freighter to keep an eye out for flooding or any other mishap. Everyone was where they should have been. The Gale Force was operational, solvent, triumphant. And McKenna still felt the same gnawing loneliness she’d felt since she’d watched Court Harrington board his plane. She figured she would be happy if the feeling was gone by the time she reached Seattle.

Beside her, Spike jumped onto the bench beside the skipper’s chair. From there, he leaped onto the dash and picked his way around the instrument panels, surveying the wheelhouse. He looked at McKenna with his big yellow eyes, and meowed, mournful.

“I know, buddy,” McKenna told the cat. She settled into her skipper’s chair, tried to get comfortable for the long journey home. “I kind of miss him, too.”

SATO COULD FEEL THE SHIP MOVING, feel the steady, rhythmic motion as the Lion and her escort sailed out of the bay and into the open ocean.

So the ship was going somewhere. Doubtless, the owners saw little merit in keeping the vessel in the tiny town of Dutch Harbor any longer. And given that the crew of the tug was American, Sato surmised that they were headed for civilization, mainland Alaska at the very least, the Lower 48 in the best case.

This was good news. This would alleviate the need for Sato and his men to conjure a way out of Dutch Harbor with the bonds. They’d brought provisions aboard with them; they could survive for two weeks, if absolutely necessary. And when the ship docked in America, they would find their way off of it, disappear into the crowd. Find sympathetic friends to facilitate their passage back to Japan.

The ship’s movement was a blessing. Far more troubling to Sato was the issue of the stolen bonds themselves. They were not where the sailor had claimed. Sato and his colleagues had searched the infirmary top to bottom and found nothing but discarded bedding and empty food containers—evidence of Hiroki Okura—but no sign of the briefcase.

Compounding the matter was the issue of the two Americans who’d made camp on the accommodations deck. To Sato’s amusement, they hadn’t claimed any of the many staterooms aboard the ship; rather, they’d spread sleeping bags in the officers’ lounge and claimed it as their bedroom. He’d had one of his colleagues, Fuchida, spy on them at night while they were sleeping.

A man and a woman, middle-aged, Fuchida had reported. They looked romantically involved, perhaps married. They did not look armed.

They would wish that they were. If Sato and his colleagues couldn’t find the bonds on this vessel, they would have to resort to more aggressive tactics.

And that was bad news for the man and woman who’d camped up above.