The Secret of Othello Read online

  “Are you okay?” Brian demanded.

  “Yeah.” Denny spat out some seawater and took his shirt from Brian’s hands. “Just wet.”

  “You can’t stop being a hero,” Brian said, with both fondness and exasperation.

  Denny hoped that meant some more kissing in the car tonight. “I guess not.”

  The ambulance crew got Fred onto a gurney. The firefighters helped Fred’s friend out of the water. The friend said, “Just like that! He keeled over, no reason,” and Denny smelled the booze on his breath, too.

  “No reason at all, huh?” asked Sgt. Bonnie Powell, who’d responded to the call. Denny had known her for years. He was happy that his father hadn’t shown up on the call. Dad deserved a night off. Powell asked, “How much have you had to drink tonight, sir?”

  “Nothing! I swear!” Fred’s friend seized Denny’s hand in an anxious grip. “You’re a lifesaver, kid. He’d be dead and I’d be explaining to his wife—”

  The rest of the sentence was cut off by the man leaning forward and choking. No, not choking. Vomiting. Denny was just one second too late in moving out of the way, and he paid for his slow reaction.

  “Oh, gross,” Brian said, from safely out of range.

  “I think I drank too much,” Fred’s friend said.

  Denny stared down at the ruined towel. And his balled-up shirt. And his shorts. Even his feet were covered with vomit. He didn’t think there’d be any more kissing until he got a hot shower. And maybe a bath in disinfectant.

  Sgt. Powell looked around. “Someone get a bucket of water!”

  “Tell your friend he’s welcome,” Denny said.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Steven heard footsteps on the deck above him. Denny appeared on the steps, wearing a Fisher Key police T-shirt and carrying his sandals.

  “How was your date?” Steven asked. “And why do you smell so bad?”

  “Because I’m a stupid Good Samaritan.” Denny surveyed the trash bags surrounding Steven, all of them stuffed with damp or ruined clothes from the house. “What are you doing?”

  “Black belt test on Saturday, right?”

  “Right.”

  “And what are we going to wear during the black belt test?”

  “We’re going to wear our…” Denny sat down on the galley bench. “Uniforms?”

  “Start digging,” Steven said.

  They found their white karate uniforms, or gis, in the bottom of one bag lumped with some muddy towels and ripped blue jeans. The mud had soaked into the white fabric and the result wasn’t pretty.

  “I’m thinking a bottle or two of bleach,” Steven said.

  Denny squinted skeptically. “Optimist.”

  “Got any quarters?”

  The marina had a small Laundromat, but the convenience store was closed. Steven resigned himself to driving into town. Then he saw that the Othello II was back in port. It must have come in while he was busy sorting through ruined clothes. Bud, the guy with the Red Sox hat, was hosing off the top deck. Steven asked if he could borrow any bleach.

  “Yeah, I think we’ve got some,” Bud said, and went below.

  He was gone for several minutes. Steven was about to give up when Claire emerged on deck. She was dressed up in a skirt and pretty green blouse, and had an industrial-sized plastic bottle in her hands.

  “Laundry at this time of night?” she asked.

  “Can’t wait another day,” Steven said. “Going out?”

  “Hoping to,” Claire said. “The engine’s busted again. I won that bet, so Bud owes me a cheeseburger.”

  “Bud?” Steven asked. “Not Harrison?”

  She gave him a sunny smile. “Jamie’s got his own plans. Don’t be jealous. I’m too old to be your type.”

  “You’re not old,” Steven protested, a flush blossoming on his face. If she let him take off her blouse he’d show her that he wasn’t some naïve kid. If she let him take off more, he’d happily forget all his plans of staying away from women all summer.

  “You’re cute,” Claire said, and that was like a knife to the heart. Puppies were cute. Kittens were cute. Steven was not a puppy or kitten. Claire continued, “Any recommendation for burgers?”

  He ducked his gaze. “The Li’l Conch Café. Can’t beat it.”

  “Excellent,” she said. “Here’s the bleach. Have fun.”

  Sitting in the Laundromat, watching the laundry machine spin and slosh water, he wondered how Tristan and her father had enjoyed their afternoon in Key West. Not that he cared what she was doing right now. He wasn’t even thinking about her. He pulled out his phone and debated calling Melissa Hardy, like he’d promised. Or Jen or Kelsey, who’d both sent new text messages. Or the recruiter in Miami, Master Chief King, who certainly wouldn’t be in the office right now, but how about that waiver, huh?

  You’re cute, Claire had said.

  Two thorough washings over the next hour didn’t get the stains out. Steven tried to figure out where they would get new uniforms in the next three days, considering the nearest martial arts store was up in Homestead. He put the ruined ones in the dryer anyway and went back down to the Idle. Denny had showered and was on the phone with Dad.

  “He was only maybe fifty feet out,” Denny was saying. “Not any trouble at all.”

  Dad said something Steven couldn’t hear.

  Denny replied, “Okay. I will.”

  Steven snagged an apple from the refrigerator. When Denny hung up, he asked, “Who was only fifty feet out?”

  “Some drunk guy who dumped his Jet Ski,” Denny replied.

  “You help him?”

  “No, I let him drown. Where are the uniforms?”

  “Bad news. One of us is going to have to drive up to Homestead and get new ones.”

  Denny scowled. “Brad hired us until Friday afternoon. They’ll be closed on a Friday night.”

  “Maybe Eddie could go up for us.”

  “He’d screw it up.”

  “You don’t have to be so negative.”

  “I’m not negative.” Denny grabbed some of the garbage bags. “But he’d mess it up somehow.”

  “When you come up with a better plan, let me know,” Steven said.

  It was Denny’s turn to sleep in the galley bed. After stowing away the bags of clothes, he converted the table and benches and then flopped down on his pillow. He mumbled something about just one night’s good rest. Steven waited another half hour before he went to retrieve the uniforms out of the dryer. He liked the marina at night—the softly lapping waves, all the boaters tucked in their beds, even the seagulls quiet. Fisher Key itself was a flat low profile under the stars, and he imagined how quiet it must have been a hundred years ago, or maybe two hundred years ago, when the only occupants had been some Spanish fishermen, escaped slaves, and Native Americans.

  The laundry room was empty except for some flies buzzing around the fluorescent lights. As he folded the uniforms he watched through the window as a dark van pulled into the parking lot. Because of the angle, Steven couldn’t see the plates or the driver. It sat there, idling, muffled music playing inside. Hard rock, maybe, not something he liked. After a moment or two, the van started rolling forward. The side door slid open, and a man fell out—no, not fell, was pushed, was pushed hard, and he tumbled down to the asphalt and didn’t move.

  The van peeled off. Steven sprinted across the lot and dropped down to a crouch.

  “Hey, are you all right?”

  A muffled curse, and the man sat up on his own—carefully, holding his right elbow. Steven recognized him in the dim parking lot lighting.

  Jamie Harrison.

  With a bloodied lip, too, and his clothes were rumpled, his face foul. He smelled like beer but didn’t seem drunk.

  “What are you doing out here?” Harrison asked.

  “Neighborhood watch. Why are guys pushing you out of a van?”

  Harrison spat blood on the ground. “I wasn’t pushed. I fell out.”

  Steven s
tood skeptically. “Gravity is a killer, huh?”

  Harrison hauled himself upright. He didn’t sway, exactly, but it was clear that more than just his arm was hurting him. “Leave it alone, kid. None of your business.”

  Which was true in all sorts of ways, surely, but Steven had never been good at quelling his curiosity. Especially when people called him “kid.”

  “You owe them money?” he asked.

  “No, I don’t owe anyone money,” Harrison retorted.

  He was a jerk, and he probably deserved whatever had happened to him in the van, but Steven’s father had always said the law was for everyone, not just the people you liked.

  “My dad can help,” Steven said. “He’s a cop.”

  “Oh, yes, because that’s exactly what I need,” Harrison bit out, swinging around. “Isn’t that perfect? Here you are, playing junior detective, playing around on your little boat, the whole world waiting for you. You’ve got it made, don’t you?”

  Steven blinked. “That’s what you think?”

  Harrison took three steps forward with a knowing smirk. “Oh, I know it. You think you’ve got the whole thing worked out, right? Never left home and never been on your own, but you’ve figured out all the secrets of life.”

  Steven forced his hands to stay flat against his legs and his voice to stay steady. “The secret is not to get pushed out of a van.”

  Harrison laughed. Not a nice sound. “Yeah. That’s it.”

  He turned and walked off. Steven debated following him. It figured that something was shady about the guy. He’d sensed it from the beginning. But that didn’t mean he should get involved. Better just to make sure that none of it spilled over in the marina or on people that he liked.

  Steven retrieved the uniforms and watched Harrison go down and board his ship.

  “I’m watching you,” Steven murmured.

  Of course Harrison couldn’t hear him. But he turned back anyway, maybe sensing Steven’s eyes on him, and for a long moment didn’t move.

  They might have stayed that way for hours, locked and staring, but finally Harrison went aboard his boat and took his secrets with him.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  A ringing phone dragged Denny out of sleep the next morning. The ringtone was a Toby Keith song. Denny hated Toby Keith.

  “Steven, answer that,” he groaned.

  No answer. More ringing. Stupid phone. Denny stumbled out of bed and groped around on the galley counter, where Steven had left his phone plugged in for charging. The caller ID said MEPS. Denny blinked at it, mind fuzzy. Who was MEPS? Outside the porthole, the sun was already up and sparkling over the gorgeous blue ocean.

  “Hello?” Denny asked, yawning around the world.

  “Up and at ’em, recruit,” said an insanely cheerful voice. “I’ve got some news for you.”

  “You do?”

  “They want you to take another vision test. Can you be here Friday afternoon?”

  “What?” Denny scratched the side of his head. “No, wait, is this Master Chief King? This is Denny.”

  The voice remained cheerful. “Your brother better be out putting in his miles. Tell him noon, sharp, my office, and we’ll go to the doctor together.”

  “I’ll tell him,” Denny promised.

  He changed Steven’s ringtone to a Lady Gaga song and turned on the coffeepot.

  Steven returned from his run twenty minutes later. When Denny told him about the vision test, he said, “Stop joking around.”

  “I’m not kidding.”

  “If you’re lying, I’ll drown you.”

  Denny leaned back in his deck chair and tossed him his phone. “Call him back.”

  Steven walked away down the dock, phone to his ear, toward the Othello II. Denny watched him. When Steven came back, he looked a lot less happy than Denny expected.

  “What?” Denny asked. “It’s good news.”

  “It’s another test!” Steven said.

  “So?”

  “So, if I failed the last one, I’m going to fail this one, too!”

  “You’re not color-blind,” Denny insisted. “You know it and I know it.”

  Steven folded his arms and gazed out over the ocean. “We have to dive with Brad and Tristan on Friday.”

  “I have to dive with Brad and Tristan on Friday,” Denny said. “You have to go to Miami. And hey, you can pick up our uniforms on the way back. Win-win.”

  “You’ll need help on Friday,” Steven said stubbornly.

  “We’ll find it,” Denny replied. “Come on, I made pancakes.”

  Steven perked up immediately.

  They ate, practiced kicks and katas, and waited for Brad and Tristan. They didn’t show up until eight forty-five, and neither looked happy. Denny was about to comment on them being late when he saw the reason why. Ten-year-old Jimmy was with them, a mulish expression on his face.

  “His babysitter’s sick,” Tristan explained. “He has to come out with us today.”

  Jimmy threatened, “I’m going to throw up over everything. You’ll see.”

  Steven grabbed Brad’s camera gear from the back of the van and gave Denny a look that said, You deal with it.

  Denny decided to accept it all as an unexpected leadership test. “We’ve got ginger ale. Always good for seasickness.”

  Jimmy said, “I hate ginger ale.”

  Brad asked, “Since when?”

  “Since I’ve always hated it,” Jimmy replied, eyeing the Idle like she was a death trap he was about to be ensnared in.

  Tristan muttered, “Drama queen.”

  Brad’s goal for the day was to dive the Gap, a colorful coral canyon four miles southeast of Key Colony Beach, and then a trip to Sombrero Reef.

  “I was talking to some people in Key West,” he said. “They mentioned a wreck called the Agana.”

  Denny chose his reply carefully. “You must have been talking to some very experienced locals. The Agana’s mostly a secret.”

  Brad didn’t back down. “They said she’s more interesting than the Rumney Marsh.”

  “More dangerous,” Denny said. “Not more interesting. The Coast Guard lists her as a hazard. No reputable dive company would take a tourist out there.”

  Brad turned away to check on his equipment. Denny waited for him to ask more, to press more, but apparently that was it.

  For now at least.

  Steven set course and took them out. In the galley, Tristan asked Denny if there was a portable TV on board.

  “No,” Denny said.

  “Everyone has a TV.” Jimmy was kicking the leg of the galley table and resolutely not looking out the porthole beside him. “The sitter had a forty-inch screen and HDTV.”

  “We live a little rougher than that out here,” Denny said.

  “Any books?” Tristan asked.

  Denny grabbed a bottle of water. “There might be a deck of cards in those drawers.”

  Jimmy said, “I’m too old for Go Fish.”

  “Play poker,” Denny suggested.

  “And I’m too young for poker,” Jimmy said.

  “You’re never too young for that,” Denny said. “You could be the reigning champ of fourth grade.”

  Jimmy scowled. “Fifth grade.”

  “Maybe something other than poker,” Tristan suggested.

  Denny tried to remember back to games he knew in fifth grade. “How about War? I’ll teach you, and then you can beat the pants off Steven.”

  He taught them the basic rules before it was time to check over the gear. The site didn’t have any mooring buoys, so Steven took them carefully over a spot where the anchor would land in sand and not on the fragile reef. Jimmy came out to watch his dad and sister don their gear. He didn’t look green, exactly, but he didn’t look healthy, either.

  “I’m going to hurl,” Jimmy threatened.

  Denny gave Steven a pointed look. Your turn.

  Steven scowled.

  Brad said, “You’ll be fine, Jimmy. Keep your e
yes on the horizon and drink that ginger ale.”

  “But Dad…” Jimmy whined.

  “See you later, squirt,” Tristan said, and went overboard.

  Denny sank happily into the water beside her.

  *

  The first vomit appeared five minutes after Steven was left alone with the kid.

  “That’s just gross,” he said, looking at the mess on the galley floor.

  Jimmy groaned and curled up on the bench. “It’s not my fault.”

  “I know,” Steven said. And he did know seasickness wasn’t a matter of willpower. It was all about the inner ear and equilibrium. He dropped a handful of paper towels on the mess and poured some ginger ale. “Here. Drink this.”

  Jimmy’s face screwed up. “I don’t like it.”

  “And I don’t like doing somersaults on a hardwood floor, but sometimes you have to do what you have to do.”

  “Who makes you do somersaults on a wooden floor?” Jimmy asked, taking the glass but not drinking from it.

  “In karate class.”

  “You do karate? Are you a black belt?”

  “Not yet,” Steven replied. He couldn’t even be sure he’d have one after Saturday. He might freeze up, run out of energy, or just screw up the whole thing altogether. But a bigger problem was the damned vision test on Friday, a totally unexpected development. He couldn’t even study for that one. He wished the Navy had just approved the waiver instead of making him go through more torture.

  Jimmy sat up. “Will you show me some karate punches?”

  “I’ll teach you some,” Steven said. “If you drink your ginger ale.”

  Jimmy drank half of it, which was good enough. Steven showed him some stretches, just warming up, and then said, “Stand like this, with your legs turned out and knees bent. This is horse stance.”

  As far as a cure for seasickness went, karate wasn’t it. Jimmy threw up again just fifteen minutes later, and made a more spectacular mess then the first time. He was determined to keep going, though, and so after a brief rest was up and moving again.

  “If I learned karate, I could beat up the bullies in my school,” Jimmy said.