Chapter 3 - THE DEAD MAN’S COMPASS
Elias stepped forward, the iron hook gleaming in the afternoon sun.
"Armed and dangerous," the old fisherman repeated, his eyes locked on Mara. "You don't look armed. But murder is a heavy word out here on the water."
"I didn't kill anyone!" Mara pleaded, her voice cracking. She pushed herself backward, her wet boots sliding against the deck. "Thomas was my friend! I found his body in the cargo hold this morning!"
"And then you jumped ship?" Elias asked, his grip tightening on the handle.
"I was pushed!" she yelled, frustration overriding her fear. "Captain Ward kicked me over the rail. In front of half the crew!"
Elias stopped. The deep lines around his eyes crinkled. He looked at her shivering, desperate form, then out at the empty ocean where the Azure Queen had disappeared. Slowly, he lowered the hook.
"A captain throwing his own crew overboard in broad daylight," Elias muttered, shaking his head. "That's a desperate man. Or a terrified one."
He walked over to the wheelhouse and grabbed a thermos, pouring a cup of steaming black coffee. He handed it to her. "Drink. You're no murderer. A killer wouldn't look so confused. So, what did you see that got you thrown to the sharks?"
Mara took the cup with trembling hands, the heat searing her numb palms. She thought about Thomas. The chief engineer had been nervous for days. He told her the ship was sitting lower in the water than the cargo manifest justified. Phantom weight, he had called it.
"I don't know," Mara admitted. "Thomas found something in the lower decks. Whatever it is, the captain is hiding it."
She looked down at the tarnished silver locket she was still clutching. She opened it again, staring at the wax-coated drawing of the red monster.
"What's that?" Elias asked, leaning closer.
"The captain's son," Mara whispered. "He slipped it into my pocket right before he kicked me over."
Elias frowned. "A child's drawing? That's what you got almost killed for?"
Mara ran her thumb over the waxy surface. The crayon was laid on unusually thick. She turned the paper over. The back was blank, but as the sunlight hit it at an angle, she saw them. Tiny, almost invisible indentations. Pinpricks punched through the paper from the front.
"Hold this," she said, handing Elias the coffee.
She held the paper up to the sun. The light pierced through the tiny holes, creating a constellation of bright dots.
Elias gasped. "That’s not a drawing. That’s a punch-card chart."
He hurried into the wheelhouse and pulled out a large, rolled-up nautical map. Mara followed, dripping onto the floorboards. Elias laid the child's drawing flat against the map, aligning the punched holes with the grid lines of the Baja coastline.
The red monster's eyes perfectly aligned with two coordinates.
"Los Arcos," Elias breathed, tapping a desolate stretch of coastline on the map. "It's an abandoned naval shipyard. Cartels use it. Smugglers. Nobody goes there unless they want to disappear."
Mara stared at the map. "The Azure Queen is scheduled to dock in Honolulu in three days. Why would it detour to a smuggler's cove?"
"Because of whatever your dead friend found," Elias said grimly.
Suddenly, a new sound cut through the air. A low, rhythmic thumping that rattled the wheelhouse windows.
Elias bolted to the deck, shielding his eyes. Mara followed his gaze.
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A sleek, matte-black interceptor boat was tearing across the waves, heading straight for them. It flew no flag, but the heavily armed men standing on the bow told them everything they needed to know.
"They didn't just broadcast a warning," Elias said, his voice dropping to a terrified whisper. "They sent a cleanup crew. Get below deck. Now!"
