Wreckers' Key by Christine Kling Read Free Book Online

monotone. “Tell me exactly what you saw.”
    I closed my eyes, and the image appeared as detailed as though I had captured it on film. I opened one eye. “Cat, are you sure you want to hear this?”
    “Yes,” she said, and her mouth was the only part of her that moved. Her body was so rigid, it looked as though she had been cast in concrete.
    I nodded, pulled in a long breath, and closed my eyes again. The image was still there. “Okay. His body was facedown on the sail, his head half underwater, his face submerged. I knew immediately that he had to be dead. I didn’t recognize the wet suit or the windsurfer, but from the hair and the shape, I was certain it was Nestor. I reached down, grabbed a corner of the sail, and pulled him to me. A piece of line was wrapped around his far arm and tangled in the harness he wore. I reached for the arm closer to me, and his skin felt cold. There was no pulse. He’d been like that for a while. Later, when the Coast Guard got there and lifted his face out of the water, I saw a big contusion on his temple. Here.” I touched my head at my hairline. “I think he hit his head on the mast, was knocked unconscious, and then drowned.”
    Her spine stiffened and she turned her head, locked her eyes on mine. It was like looking down the twin shafts of an abandoned mine. “No,” she said. She started shaking her head. “No, no, that’s not possible.”
    “Cat, that’s exactly what happened.” I put my hand on her shoulder.
    She shook off my hand and stood up. “No, that’s not what I mean.” She began to pace the cramped room, speaking to herself in Spanish, her hands gesturing wildly. I got the feeling she was speaking to Nestor.
    “Catalina, come here, sit down.” I patted the bunk beside me.
    She spun around to face me. Her back was straight, her eyes flashed, and she looked like a very pregnant African warrior queen. “No, do not patronize me. What you are describing to me was not an accident. Someone killed my husband.”

VI

    By nine o’clock Monday morning, I’d already been into town to walk Abaco, grabbed coffee and some breakfast taquitos at the Turtle Kraals Restaurant, and I was back out on Gorda trying to whittle down a few more jobs off my to-do list. I hoped that immersing myself in some mundane tasks would allow me to take my mind off Nestor, but it wasn’t working. I found myself throwing tools around and spouting tears over the least little problem. The starboard diesel tank had developed a small leak, and I was hanging upside down in the bilge with a flashlight trying to see the fitting where the hose exited the aluminum tank when I heard someone call my boat’s name on the VHF.
    “ Gorda , Gorda , this is Power Play . ”
    With a shower of curses, I shimmied my body out of the crevice under the aft deck and headed up to the wheelhouse to answer the radio. I recognized the voice. It was the mate, Drew, the guy I’d met yesterday on the big yacht.
    “I’m calling to give you a message,” he said. “Mr. Berger has been trying to reach you. He sounded kind of pissed when he found out you didn’t have a cell phone.”  
    “The VHF works fine as far as I’m concerned.”
    “He’s staying at the Hyatt. Told me to tell you to stop by his hotel this morning to discuss towing the boat back to Lauderdale.”
    “Thanks, Drew. I’ll head in there soon as I clean up a little out here.”
    “From what I’ve seen of him, he expects people to jump when he says so.”
    “Well, I’ve never responded well to folks like that. I jump when I’m ready.”
    After we signed off, I went into the head to wash off the diesel and dirty bilgewater. I kept thinking about Catalina and her insistence last night that, based on my description of Nestor, someone must have arranged the body, entwining his hand in the lines.
    “Seychelle,” she’d said, “he is an amazing windsurfer. He could have turned pro and made money doing that, but he got it into his head that he