Mystery of the Tempest Read online

  Brian had been telling himself not to get his hopes up. Insanely hot, smart, and gay? The trifecta. And he wasn’t going to win it tonight.

  He tried not to look disappointed. Instead, he asked, “So why did you invite me out here?”

  “Because it sucks to get ditched at your own graduation party.”

  The chugging motor was the only sound for a few moments. Brian watched the shoreline, looking for his parents’ house. He’d never seen it from the water.

  “They say you’re going into the Coast Guard Academy,” he said.

  “I go away for training next month. They call it ‘Swab Summer.’”

  “Why the Coast Guard? Why not the Navy?”

  Denny said, “The Navy fights wars. The Coast Guard rescues people. How about you?”

  “I’m going to MIT.”

  “Yeah?” Denny looked impressed. “Science geek?”

  “No. I’m going to study history.”

  “They have that there?”

  “Sure. They have lots of things.”

  “Was that what you were reading before graduation? I saw you brought a book to the band room,” Denny said.

  Brian didn’t tell him he’d brought the book because he was too shy to talk to anyone there. “Biography of Marie Antoinette. She got married to the future king of France when she was only fourteen. Isn’t that crazy?”

  As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he regretted them. Eighteenth-century history wasn’t usually a popular topic in teen circles. Denny was going to think he was a total idiot.

  But Denny didn’t seem to be listening. He was staring at a silhouette on the water nearby. He cut the motor.

  “Look at her,” he said. “Isn’t she beautiful?”

  The boat ahead of them was long and low in the waves, her sails down for the night. Brian didn’t know much about boats, and it was too dark to make out many details, but Denny certainly looked happy.

  “Whose is it?” Brian asked.

  “I don’t know,” Denny said. “Steven and I saw her out on the water today. I’d give anything for a boat like that.”

  The motorboat rocked gently beneath them, water lapping at the hull. Brian took in a deep breath of salty air. The brass fittings on the yacht gleamed in the moonlight. Perfect. Denny’s expression was open and reverential, like a kid at Christmas.

  Maybe one day someone would look at Brian that way.

  The breeze shifted, salt giving way to the acrid smell of smoke.

  “What is that?” Brian asked.

  Red flames erupted from the yacht’s foredeck.

  Denny stood up, his reverence turning to horror. “She’s on fire!”

  Chapter Five

  Denny brought the motorboat closer to the burning yacht, yelling, “Hey! Fire!”

  No one answered. No sign of life anywhere on The Tempest, but someone might be unconscious or trapped below deck. Denny handed his cell phone to Brian and kicked off his shoes.

  “Call for help,” he said. “Tell them we’re off Beacon Point.”

  “Where are you going?”

  Denny dove off into the warm salty water. He surfaced a few yards later and swam with sure strokes to the yacht’s starboard side. The fire was licking up her bow toward the masts with frightening speed. She had been built to be close to the water and he had no trouble grabbing her lines.

  Just as he started to haul himself upward, an enormous whoosh blasted from deep within the ship. A bellow of hot air pushed him backward into the deep.

  Explosion, Denny thought, and then he thought no more.

  *

  The blast from The Tempest made Brian throw up his arms and stagger backward over the side of the motorboat and into the ocean. He hit hard, water slamming up his nose and mouth. The crash took his glasses away instantly. He choked, flailed, tried to break through to the surface. The only thing around him was blackness, and he was drowning.

  I’m too young to drown, he thought in dismay.

  Panic made him kick his legs wildly. He reached out, felt something like the wind on his hand. He moved in that direction. Broke into the fresh air, coughing so hard he thought his eyes were popping out of his head.

  He couldn’t see anything, couldn’t breathe right, couldn’t find anything to hold on to.

  And he didn’t know where Denny was. Was he drowning just a few feet away, injured and helpless?

  Brian hacked out more water. His vision was full of hot red stars that had nothing to do with the sky. He could smell burning wood and fuel, and there was a fuzzy red and yellow ball of flame nearby. But where was the damn motorboat? Where was Denny?

  His shoes were dragging him down, and his limbs felt uncoordinated. He tried not to panic again, but the water was closing over his head again—

  “Easy!” a man’s voice said, close to his ear. “Hold on, kid.”

  Strong, confident arms wrapped around his chest. Brian was so startled he sucked in more water and started to struggle. His rescuer didn’t let him go.

  “My friend,” Brian coughed out.

  “What friend?”

  “He’s here somewhere!”

  A moment later, Brian felt his hands being guided to something hard and high—the motorboat. Smoke and ash blew into his face.

  “Stay here,” the man said and dove away.

  Brian started to pull himself into the boat. It was ridiculously hard because the stupid thing kept trying to slide out from under his rubbery hands. When he did succeed, he collapsed half on and half off a bench, still coughing.

  The yacht was still aflame, the mystery guy had disappeared, and where was Denny?

  With a splash and a gasp, the stranger broke the surface. Denny was in his arms, limp and unmoving.

  “Here, take him!”

  Brian leaned over the side and helped haul Denny aboard.

  “Don’t die,” Brian begged him. “Breathe, don’t die.”

  The stranger pulled himself in. He was tall and well-built in the red light of the burning boat. He was clad only in tight black swim trunks.

  “He’s not going to die,” the man said, and gave Denny what Brian thought was the Heimlich maneuver.

  Immediately Denny began to vomit up water. He flailed in the stranger’s arms until he could bend over and choke out more. Brian held Denny’s shoulder, steadying him.

  “You kids nearly got yourself killed,” the stranger said.

  “Where did you come from?” Brian asked.

  “I was swimming by,” was the answer, and it didn’t sound like the stranger was joking.

  Before Brian could ask more, the man started up the motor and steered them away from the burning wreck. A Coast Guard boat with spinning red lights was rounding Beacon Point, and other boats had started out from land.

  Denny continued to cough and wheeze, but he didn’t seem hurt.

  Somehow Brian didn’t think they were going to make it to Jennifer O’Malley’s party.

  *

  Steven heard the boom of an explosion and looked out the porthole to see The Tempest on fire several hundred yards offshore. The fuel tank must have exploded. He abandoned what he’d been doing to Kelsey and reached for his pants.

  “Where are you going?” Kelsey asked breathlessly.

  “Someone’s in trouble!”

  He raced along the dock barefoot, shoes and shirt in hand. The explosion had brought several spectators down from the yacht club, including Steven’s parents and the club president, Ed Berman.

  “I hope no one was aboard,” Mom said, her gaze worried.

  “We’d better go see,” Ed Berman said. “We’ll take my boat.”

  “Can I come too, Dad?” Steven asked.

  His father disconnected the cell phone he’d been using to call the police station. Although off duty, he was still in uniform—the biggest guy on the island, an ex-football star from the University of Miami. He eyed Steven’s disheveled clothes and said, “Looks like you’re busy enough.”

 
Mom agreed, “Yes, you should stay here.”

  “I won’t get in the way,” Steven said. “You might need a hand.”

  Ed Berman had volunteered his boat, but he wasn’t quite sober enough to steer. Dad took the helm and Steven got to tag along after all. Four minutes out, they met up with Sean Garrity’s motorboat.

  “Dennis?” Dad asked, and Steven’s jaw dropped. The boat was full with his twin, Brian Vandermark, and the guy with the fishing boat they’d met out on the water that afternoon.

  All of them were drenched and Denny was coughing like he’d swallowed half the ocean.

  Dad’s face creased with concern. “What are you doing out here, Dennis?”

  “Boat blew up, Dad,” was Denny’s answer.

  “I can see that,” Dad huffed out.

  Once aboard Ed Berman’s cruiser, Dad checked both Denny and Brian for injuries and Steven got them blankets from below deck. The man from the fishing boat said his name was Nathan Carter.

  “I’m training for a triathlon,” he said. “Saw the explosion and found these kids in the water.”

  “I’m glad you did,” Dad said. “You a Navy man?”

  Nathan Carter paused. “Was. Not any longer.”

  He looked exactly like the kind of super-athlete who thought nothing of swimming around the Atlantic Ocean late at night. But up close, Steven could see a long scar down the back of Carter’s leg. Maybe he’d gotten out of the military on a disability. Or maybe he wasn’t what he said he was. It seemed awfully coincidental that he’d been out there just in time to save Denny and Brian.

  Dad turned to Denny. “And what were you two doing out here?”

  Which led to a jumbled story about going to Jennifer O’Malley’s party via boat, and Brian needed a ride, and no, Denny hadn’t been drinking, swear it.

  Steven watched Dad carefully for signs of doubt. Did he suspect that Denny and Brian had been on the water for some romantic reason? Could he tell Denny was gay? Their parents occasionally hinted that Denny should date more, and he had in fact taken a girl to the prom, but that was only a friendship thing.

  “And then we stopped because it’s a beautiful ship.” Denny gazed sorrowfully at the still-burning wreck. “Was beautiful.”

  “Damn shame,” Ed Berman said from the helm. “Hell of an accident.”

  “If it was an accident,” Carter said.

  Steven asked, “You think it was deliberate?”

  “I saw someone swimming away from the boat just before it blew.” Carter’s voice and face were both grim. “You better ask him.”

  Chapter Six

  Brian’s parents seriously freaked out over the almost-getting-killed part.

  “This is supposed to be a nice peaceful island!” Henrik ranted, stalking around their living room in a big circle. “Peaceful does not mean things blowing up!”

  His Danish accent was getting thicker. Half the time, Brian forgot that Henrik came from overseas, but the accent always appeared when he was upset. Brian decided that now was not a good time to disagree. The Florida Keys had never been particularly peaceful. Not with drunk drivers careening down the Overseas Highway, drug runners zooming offshore, even the occasional murder or two.

  Mom petted Brian’s knee. “Accidents happen. We were lucky.”

  Brian nodded dumbly. Maybe he was in shock. He didn’t feel like he was in shock. Mostly, he felt cold. The air-conditioning was set too high, as usual. He was glad for the green blanket Mom had wrapped him in. The blanket also kept him from getting the sofa wet. It was a nice sofa, white leather to match the white rug and white walls and white curtains.

  The darkest things in the room were the glass doors overlooking the Florida Straits, the half moon still visible in the sky. Well, kind of visible. Blurry visible. He wondered where his spare eyeglasses were.

  Henrik tugged at his thinning hair and continued stalking around the room. “Let’s see what the FBI says. Accident or maybe not an accident. Smugglers. Spies. Who knows? Murder on The Temper!”

  “Tempest,” Mom corrected him.

  Henrik’s face turned redder.

  “Come on, honey,” Mom said. “You’ll feel better after a hot shower.”

  Under the hot spray of water, Brian remembered the feel of Denny’s shoulder under his hand. The way Denny had ridden close to him on the way back to shore. Not that it meant anything, because Denny had said he wasn’t gay. Wasn’t gay at all. Was entirely heterosexual.

  Actually, Denny hadn’t said that last part at all.

  He crawled into his comfortable bed, glad to be away from anything that rocked or bobbed back and forth. He was asleep in seconds. In his dreams, The Tempest whooshed into crimson flames over and over again, and Denny was a dark body floating lifelessly in the water. He struggled awake to hear voices in the kitchen.

  “—totally in flames, man!” Christopher was saying, loud and excited. “It’s the first time I ever saw something blow up in real life!”

  Brian’s mom said something, her voice pitched low.

  “Oh, sorry! I’ll keep my voice down. Do you have any nachos?”

  Brian pulled a pillow over his head and went back to sleep. The next thing he knew, sunlight was streaming through his bedroom windows. When he went out into the kitchen his mother was assembling a gift basket of fresh fruit, homemade granola, and dark chocolate from Belgium, along with fresh cut leaves for decoration and a large blue ribbon to top everything off.

  “Who’s that for?” Brian asked.

  “Nathan Carter, for saving your life,” Mom said. “I want you to take it over to him.”

  “Me?” he squeaked out.

  “He saved your life.”

  “He saved Denny’s life. I was doing fine.”

  “It’s the least we can do.”

  Henrik was sipping from his enormous coffee mug. “I could write him a check.”

  “No!” Brian said. “That’s not what you do. It’s not like a reward for finding a stray dog.”

  Both of them looked at him with concern.

  “Are you feeling all right?” Mom asked.

  “I’m fine. “

  “I made an appointment with Dr. Elliot,” she said. “Just in case. Go get dressed, I’ll run you over.”

  “Mom, I don’t need a doctor.”

  “Just a quick appointment. You always want to make sure about these things.”

  They stopped by the public marina on the way. Carter was on the deck of the most dilapidated boat that Brian had ever seen on the water. Now that he was wearing his glasses again and it was daylight, Brian could see he was incredibly handsome. Drop-dead handsome, like a hunky calendar model.

  “Ahoy!” Mom said. “Anchors aweigh!”

  Thus commenced several embarrassing minutes while Mom thanked Carter over and over. Carter looked surprised by the gift basket, but nodded politely.

  “I’m glad I was useful,” was all he said about saving Denny and Brian.

  Dr. Elliot’s waiting room was empty when they got to his office on the highway. The doctor smelled like cigarettes, but he was friendly and efficient as he examined Brian’s ears and pupils.

  “You were right there when that boat blew up, hmm?” Elliot asked. “Must have been impressive.”

  “If you like things blowing up,” Brian said.

  Elliot picked up his stethoscope. “Things are always blowing up around those Anderson boys. Breathe deeply for me and hold it.”

  When he could talk again, Brian asked, “What kinds of things?”

  “Hmmm?”

  “Are always blowing up around the Andersons?”

  “They lead very eventful lives. Boy detectives, don’t you know. Always helping out their dad and anyone else who needs something solved or fixed.”

  The doctor couldn’t find anything wrong with him, so he sent Brian off with recommendations for rest and aspirin. Mom drove him home with her wedding ring tapping restlessly on the steering wheel. When they got home Christopher was gone, off r
etrieving Brian’s car from the yacht club.

  “I told him that would help redeem himself,” Henrik said from the kitchen island, where he was pouring himself coffee.

  “Redeem himself from what?” Brian asked.

  Mom said, “He was high when he came home last night.”

  “Oh.” Brian eased himself onto a stool. “Sorry.”

  “You’re not the one who broke the law,” Henrik replied. “What if he had been caught and arrested? More problems. His parents would blame us.”

  Actually, Christopher’s parents were just as likely to smoke their own pot, but Brian didn’t think he should point that out. Henrik was very strict about drugs and speed limits and rules. Maybe it was that discipline that had made him a millionaire businessman. Brian didn’t know much about Henrik’s business, but he certainly had a lot of money.

  Mom sat on the stool beside Brian. “We don’t think you and Christopher should go down to Key West tonight.”

  “What?” Brian asked. “Why not?”

  “You need rest,” Mom said.

  “And the police might need to talk to you some more,” Henrik said.

  “I told Captain Anderson everything I know,” Brian said. “I’m not going to suddenly remember some important fact or something. Besides, I can rest down there with him just like I can rest here. And I promised Christopher.”

  The promise had been a weekend at a very nice hotel overlooking the ocean. Two beds, just so Christopher wouldn’t feel pressured to rekindle anything—but hey, if things happened, they happened, and when he’d made the reservations Brian secretly hoped they would.

  Henrik stared down in his coffee cup. “It’s not a good time to go. Some reporters have called for interviews, and who knows what else might happen. Your mother and I—well, we worry.”

  Mom squeezed Brian’s hand. “Can’t you stay?”

  “It’s the day after I graduated from high school, and Christopher goes back to Boston on Monday,” Brian said. “I’ve done everything you ever asked me to do, including leave all my friends to come down here to the middle of nowhere. So if I want to take Christopher to Key West, just like I promised him, I think you need to let me.”