Knight's Cross (The Shipwreck Adventures Book 3) Page 3

  “So he’s back to treasure hunting?”

  “Not exactly. See, in his field, there are people who just want to get rich—treasure hunters. Cole calls them poachers and con men. There are others who want to preserve history. They’re the archeologists. After Cole found the submarine Surcouf in the Caribbean, he had a difficult four years on the run, feeling as though he had joined the dark side.”

  “You’ve never told me exactly what he and Theo found on that submarine.”

  Riley smiled at her friend. “And I never will.”

  “There really was gold?”

  Riley laughed. “Now what did I just say?”

  “Not a crumb for your dearest friend?”

  “Let’s just say that Cole doesn’t want or need to look for treasure, but he is looking for a little personal redemption. He needs to find windmills to tilt at.”

  “So that’s what sparked his interest in the Knights of Malta?”

  “Hazel, I don’t know. I thought it was just more of his fascination with conspiracy theories and secret societies. But he’s started acting so paranoid again.”

  “I thought things were much better between you two. Darling, you’re getting married in a few months.”

  “I know. And things were better for a while. In the Philippines, when his Full Fathom Five Maritime Foundation brokered that agreement and the government repatriated so much of the Japanese war loot, he seemed to feel better about himself for a while. He wasn’t a treasure hunter, he was a real archeologist again.”

  “And how was he while you two were sailing your boat halfway around the world?”

  Riley nibbled at an olive. “He occasionally mentioned the Knights of Malta, and he was reading books about them, but he didn’t seem obsessed anymore. No more mention of conspiracies. I thought we were done with that.” Riley lifted her chin and surveyed the deep-blue horizon. She nodded to herself. “We had a year of fantastic sailing, swimming and snorkeling over tropical reefs, and making love. We laughed all the time, Hazel.”

  “You deserved it, girlfriend, after all you’ve been through.”

  “So Theo took an apartment in Turkey near the boatyard, and he oversaw everything while we went cruising. By going public with the treasure find in the Philippines, Cole had become too much of a public figure. He eventually believed the organizations he had thwarted, both in the Caribbean and in the Philippines, would finally leave him alone.”

  “So, what changed?”

  “When we got to Turkey, he wasn’t happy about several things on the new boat. I won’t bore you with all the details, but Cole started making changes. Change orders are the tar pits of construction projects. The launch date kept getting pushed back. We’ve been living aboard Bonefish on a mooring off the boatyard, and he started coming home from the boatyard and spending hours reading his father’s journals. The paranoia came back. Every time he went into town, he swore he was being followed. I can’t even remember the last time I heard him laugh.”

  “Oh, Riley.”

  “I set a date for the wedding in Malta, the weekend after Mother’s Day.”

  “And that’s a problem now?”

  “It was my mother’s idea. She and her husband are supposed to fly into Malta for Mother’s Day, and there will be a week of wedding prep before the ceremony on Saturday. It’s all been booked. My mother has turned into a crazed wedding planner, inviting half of France and Washington, DC. And then, last week, Cole said it was Dig who was following him.”

  Hazel refilled Riley’s glass. “Drink up, honey.”

  Riley shook her head. “He won’t even talk about the wedding now. He says I’d be better off without him.”

  “I’m so sorry. I know that must hurt.”

  “I haven’t said anything to my mother. Hazel, he’s not being rational. I don’t believe in ghosts.”

  “Oh really? Aren’t you the one who talks to your dead brother?”

  “But I don’t claim to have seen Michael walking around. There’s no way Diggory Priest could have survived that day.”

  “But didn’t they say the same thing about Cole?”

  “That’s different.”

  “Different how?”

  “Cole had scuba gear, for one thing. Hazel, I dove off that speedboat just before Pinky rammed it with a big sportfishing boat. I left Diggory standing on the deck. I swam down as hard and fast as I could. Then I felt the concussion through the water. It was a massive explosion. Afterward, I swam all around Shadow Chaser searching for Cole. I would have seen Diggory if he had been there. It’s just not possible.” Riley crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair.

  Hazel reached over and patted Riley’s forearm. “You were there, I wasn’t. But I just want you to remember all the times Cole said somebody wanted him dead, and it turned out to be true. You say you love him. Maybe you should consider the possibility that there is something there. That he’s not just being crazy.”

  “Hazel, I’m not like that. I need concrete evidence. I was a marine for seven years. We drilled over and over that we don’t operate on hearsay or shoot at shadows. You make decisions based on the intel you have—not on conjecture.”

  “Sounds like you need to figure out just exactly what it is you want.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It’s simple. What do you want?”

  “I want Cole to get over this craziness so we can figure out how to make a life together.”

  “And what if it’s not craziness?”

  “Come on.”

  “You said you love him. Then stand up for him. You want to marry this man, right?”

  Riley closed her eyes and saw a black-and-white image of two fingers holding her engagement ring over the ferryboat’s frothing bow wave—just bits of metal and rock, she remembered thinking—and felt herself flush. “More than anything,” she said.

  “Then help him with whatever it is that’s causing him grief. Sounds like you’ve got some research to do. Get with it and find some of that rational marine intel. Hell, protection’s your racket—or at least it was while you were an embassy security guard. Help him figure out what’s going on, and keep the nutcase safe—because, girlfriend, if you marry him, then he’ll be your nutcase.”

  Riley laughed. Looking across the harbor, she watched a dark thunderstorm on the horizon. The gray film of rain stretched from the clouds to the sea.

  “You’re right, as usual.” When she looked back at her friend, Hazel was pouring the last of the wine into Riley’s glass.

  Lifting her own glass, Hazel said, “To love.”

  Aboard the Ruse

  Vittoriosa, Malta

  February 6, 1798

  Alonso Montras paced the aft deck of his sailing ship the Ruse as he watched his men unloading the fruits of his latest prize. They had encountered the Arab merchants in a sailing dhow off the coast of Tunis, and, thanks to his vessel’s outstanding maneuverability, he had felled the dhow’s mainmast with his second cannon blast. Having disabled her thus, he’d gladly accepted the captain’s surrender and was now lightening the Ruse of her cargo of wine, olives, and silk. Once he paid the grand master his percentage and the crew theirs, his little ship should still show a very nice profit from this latest voyage.

  “Congratulations, L’Angel, you are going to be a very wealthy young man.”

  Alonso turned around, grinned, and clapped his pilot and mate Nikola on the back. “You shall do very nicely as well, my dear friend. If not for you, we never would have prevailed in that battle. She was twice our size.”

  The older man laughed out loud. “And since when is L’Angel a modest man?”

  The Maltese had started calling him by this nickname when they’d first met, and it had stuck.

  Alonso glanced at his friend out of the corner of his eye and smiled. “Rarely.”

  “Ha! That is more like it, my friend.”

  “It was a good prize, but nothing like in the days when my great-grandfather sailed as a Knight co
rsair.”

  “L’Angel, when Le Rouge de Malte sailed these waters, they were aboard the great galleys and xebecs, with hundreds of men and three times the guns our little ship can carry.”

  “There is a reason why the only remaining corsairs on the island are Maltese. All the riches now are to be had on the land caravans.”

  “L’Angel, my friend, do not worry about what once was,” Nikola said. He pulled a pipe and a pouch of tobacco out of his trouser pocket and began filling the pipe’s bowl. “Celebrate today. You are young and handsome, and though your boat may be small, your pockets soon will be full. You go. I can watch over these scoundrels.”

  Alonso continued watching the men, who had fought so hard at his side, now working to unload the cargo. Carrying only six cannon and sailed by a crew of ten men, his little two-masted xebec was designed to be swift and nimble, but deadly. She was his home now, and he thought he should stay to see his cargo ashore.

  “I have to work on the accounts,” Alonso said.

  Nikola struck a flint over his pipe bowl and puffed until he had a lungful of smoke. He exhaled and said, “That can wait. Surely you have a lady to go visit.”

  Alonso thought back on the ball he had attended, at the home of Chevalier Boisgelin, one week before he’d departed on this voyage. Boisgelin had recently returned from a caravan to the east, and he entertained lavishly. At the ball, Alonso had met many lovely young women who had clamored for the attention of the Knight corsair.

  But now that he had the funds to pursue one of the young ladies, he thought sadly that not one of them stood out in his mind.

  “No, my friend, I do not.”

  “What about that Spanish black-eyed beauty who walks the quay with her chaperone and flips the lace of her mantilla while she watches you work? What is her name? Montalban?”

  Alonso remembered her from the ball. “Yes, Maria Montalban. I danced with her once.”

  “Then go, buy her a trinket and pay her a visit. Get out of here. You are too young to spend all your life at your work.”

  Alonso climbed the steps that led away from the quay up to the shops of the city of Vittoriosa. He wondered what sort of trinket he should buy for the lady. He had a few coins in his pocket, but he had not yet been paid for his most recent prize. He passed by a tavern, and several fellow Knights called out to him when they saw him pass. They invited him to join them in their drinking. Alonso waved them off. He had no time for such nonsense.

  None of the shops captured his interest until he found himself in front of a silversmith’s workshop. Perhaps a piece of jewelry would be appropriate. He pushed his way through the heavy wood door.

  Inside the dark, low-ceilinged room he saw shelves of gleaming cutlery, platters, coffeepots, and oil lamps. All the pieces were elaborately decorated with engraved designs—shells, scrolls, leaves, flowers. These were the work more of an artist than of a craftsman.

  He reached for a tall lampier on a raised fluted base. It was so elaborate compared to the simple oil lamps he used aboard the Ruse. Implements such as tiny scissors, tweezers, and a snuffer hung from chains, while a cartouche-shaped reflector was suspended from a branch. As he ran his fingers over the shell-shaped handle, he heard someone enter the room behind him.

  “Don’t touch that.”

  He withdrew his hand and spun around.

  The female voice had been stern and deep. Alonso expected to see an older woman, perhaps the artist’s wife. Instead, the person standing before him was a girl of no more than twenty years. Her almond-shaped green eyes glowed beneath arched eyebrows. She placed one fist on the slender turn of her waist and brushed a lock of brown hair back from her eyes.

  “So, are you going to tell me what you’re looking for?” She spoke in French, which, although it was not his native tongue, he had learned to speak during his years in Malta.

  Alonso opened his mouth, but nothing came out. No one ever spoke to him in this manner, much less a shopgirl.

  “Are you mute?” she asked.

  “No, I am not.”

  “Very well, then, what do you want?”

  “Mademoiselle, I am surprised to hear you speak so boldly to a Knight of Saint John. Did your mother teach you no manners?”

  “Sir, my mother is dead.”

  “I am sorry.”

  “I have no need of your pity. But I do have work to do, so if you will tell me what you seek in this shop, I will do my best to help you.”

  “I was looking for something for a lady.”

  The girl made a little hmph sound and reached for a drawer in a bureau against the wall.

  “What did you mean by that noise?”

  “Sir, who you choose to buy silver for is no business of mine.” She pulled at the heavy wood drawer.

  “Exactly,” he said.

  The short sleeves of her blouse exposed the strength in her bare arms as she wriggled the drawer from side to side to pull it free.

  “Certainly all of us Maltese are aware,” she said as she drew out a tray covered with medallions, necklaces, and tiaras, “that our Knights, who have taken vows of chastity, poverty, and service to the pope, would never break those vows.” She lifted out a pair of elongated pear-shaped earrings made of delicate silver filigree. When she held them up for him, he saw in her face a hint of a smile. “Would the lady in question like these, perhaps?”

  “Mademoiselle, you have a very bold tongue.” As he said it, Alonso glanced at her mouth—and then he could not stop staring at her lips.

  “Sir, I have been working in my father’s shop for more than ten years, and I have seen many of your kind.”

  Alonso forced himself to look at her eyes. The shape of those green eyes gave her an exotic appearance.

  She brushed the loose lock of hair off her brow again as if unaware of his study of her features. “When my father first came to this island from France,” she continued, “the Knights were respected as warriors, sailors, and clerics. When Papa married my English mother, there was still an auberge for the Knights’ English langue. Now the grand master plays religious politics, and what I see in the behavior of your brothers does not command respect.”

  “How dare you judge men in this way.”

  “Oh, pardon me, sir. I forgot that trousers make you better than me.”

  A man’s voice shouted from the back room. “Arzella! Enough, please. For your father’s sake.”

  The girl glanced back over her shoulder and called out, “Oui, Papa.” When she turned back to face Alonso, it was as though a dark cloud had passed over her glittering eyes and dimmed their glow. She sighed. “My father is ill, and I need to return to his bedside.” She held up the earrings again. “So you’ll take these?”

  Outside the shop, Alonso crossed the street, then turned to look back at the door. Aloud he whispered, “Arzella.” He’d learned enough of the local language to translate her name. The word meant shell in Maltese. He’d never met a young woman like her. Nor a man, for that matter.

  Alonso folded back the neatly creased paper and examined the delicate filigree work of the earrings he had purchased. The craftsmanship was exquisite. He dangled one between two fingers and wondered what they would look like on Arzella.

  The Palazzo Magistral

  Via Condotti, Rome

  April 9, 2014

  Virgil Vandervoort leaned against one of the pillars framing the doorway of the Max Mara store and spit out a piece of tobacco from his hand-rolled cigarette. The man he was there to meet didn’t permit smoking in his office, and Virgil was early. He pulled smoke into his lungs and held it for several seconds before exhaling. Civilians think soldiers spend all their time fighting. If they only knew. Virgil had spent thousands of hours waiting. The skill was to spend all those hours ready to act.

  The sun burned hot for early spring. Virgil had rolled up his cuffs to bare his forearms, but he still felt his underarms growing damp. He wanted to make a good impression today. Knowing he had this meeting, he’d worn
khaki slacks instead of his usual blue jeans. He was determined to rise in the ranks.

  He heard the purr of a powerful engine. He leaned forward just in time to watch the black Bentley turn through the archway between windows for Jimmy Choo and Hermès. The tourists on this street had no idea what lay behind those gates in the middle. The concierge stepped out of his little office and smiled as he waved the car inside.

  The Sovereign Military Order of the Knights of Malta had first come to Virgil’s attention when he’d heard that General McChrystal was a member. Virgil had been out of the service for a while by then, and, while the money was good in the private security sector back home, he didn’t get to see much action. He was bored. But he thought he needed the money to keep the wife happy. That didn’t work out. Bitch divorced him and then refused to let him see his daughter. Left him no reason to stay on that side of the Atlantic.

  When he went back to Iraq as an independent contractor, Virgil was tired of the indecision-makers. He’d seen them on both sides, government and private. He was bored, and he wanted to see some action. Then he’d gone to work for Mr. Prince at Blackwater. There, they weren’t bothered by all those rules of engagement. The means didn’t matter much as long as you got results. Virgil always got results, and they’d paid him well for doing what he enjoyed.

  But when this new American president got elected, he brought in an entire administration of indecision-makers. They started prosecuting men for getting the job done. Winding down the war, they said. Even though he didn’t need the money, Virgil tried for a couple of jobs with other private military firms. The fellows interviewing him looked like they hadn’t started shaving yet. Their questions were all about technology. He never heard back from them, which was all right by him. He wasn’t going to do his job by sitting in a room playing with a joystick.

  So when he’d first learned about the Sovereign Military Order of the Knights of Malta from Mr. Prince, Virgil was able to afford to buy in. There in the Order, he’d found his third career and a real home. Ever since the Crusades, they’d hated the fucking ragheads as much as he did.