A Dolphin's Gift (17 page)

He sighed, and
said, "I can’t father children of my own because I had a vasectomy."

After a few
seconds ticked by, Nellie said, "Why?"

"I had it
done about five years ago," Will replied.

"I don't
care when you had it done," Nellie said, "only why you had it done.
Why would you do something as irrevocable as that?"

"Because
it is irrevocable," Will said.

 
Nellie felt the anxious beating of her heart.
Looking at him in alarm, she said, "Is there something wrong with you,
medically?"

"No,"
Will said.

"Then
why?"

"It's not
something you need to know," Will said. "It's a part of my life I
don't talk about, so just let it go. It has no bearing on us."

"Yes, it
does," Nellie said. "I have to know."

Will looked
askance at her. "No, you don't have to know," Will said. "We
already agreed there'd be no promises, so what difference does it make?"

"It makes
a difference to me because I care," Nellie said. "Because I love you
and I want to share your pain, whatever it is. Please, talk to me."

"No. Just
leave it be." Will pulled himself up and walked away, leaving Nellie
sitting alone on the deck.

***

Will couldn’t
sleep that night, and after a couple of hours, lying in bed mulling over
Nellie's admission that she loved him, he ventured out on the deck and was
surprised to find her standing at the railing, gazing out at sea. A fog had
settled in, masking the stars, so he knew she was there because she too
couldn't sleep. Before he could turn and leave, she heard him, and said,
"Please don't walk away. You're here because you couldn't sleep either,
and I want to talk about it."

Will walked
over to stand beside her. Bracing his hands on the railing, he said, while
gazing at a bank of heavy fog, "I have nothing to offer you."

"How can
you say that? I know what I feel when you hold me. I feel a warm, caring man
who, for whatever reason, hates himself."

Will didn't
want to talk about the past, not to Nellie, not to anyone. And he didn't want
her corrupting what they had with love. It was an empty, pointless concept. But
feeling compelled to offer something, he said, "If things were
different..." He paused. This was not something he wanted to get into. Not
tonight. Not ever.

"Different
how?" Nellie replied. "I love you, Will, and I won’t let this
rest."

Will drew in a
long breath, and said, while continuing to gaze into misty darkness,
"First of all, you don't love me because you don't know me. We spent time
together working on the boat, and we had some physical contact that was a bad
idea, but I'm a normal man with a normal sex drive, and you're a woman who's
lonely for what you lost, and you've made me into some hypothetical man to fill
the void your husband left. That's all there is to it."

"That's
not so," Nellie protested. "Well, not the part about my being lonely.
Well, I am, but that's not why I'm drawn to you. And I may not know everything
about you, and you may have something in your past you don't want to talk
about, but I can still love you."

"What's
the point?" Will asked. "You already know my position on
relationships and marriage. Nothing's changed." He knew he sounded
cynical, but Nellie was laying out plans for a future that included him, and he
couldn't let it go any further.

"Is there
ever a point in loving someone?" Nellie asked.

Will didn't
answer, because his attention was focused on something that flashed in the
distance off the starboard bow. The light of a vessel maybe. He'd seen something
earlier, but low clouds hung over the water, and whatever it was kept
disappearing. He walked forward along the railing and peered into the night...

"What is
it?" Nellie asked, moving to stand beside him.

"A
boat," Will replied. As it emerged from the mist, he realized what had
appeared to be a large vessel in the distance was actually a small cruiser
quite close. For an instant, the pinpoint of light flashed and was gone. Then
it came again.

"That does
it," he said. "I'm taking the kayak and finding out what's going
on."

"You can't
be serious," Nellie replied, grabbing his arm. "What do you expect to
gain?"

"Information,"
Will said. "Whoever they are, they've been following you since you left
Oregon, and I'm going to find out why."

"How can
you be sure it’s the same vessel?" Nellie asked. "There were dozens
of boats anchored or cruising around here earlier."

"I’m sure,"
Will said. As he turned to go, Nellie seized his arm, and said, "Please
don't go. If it's the man from the marina he has a gun and you don't."

Will pulled his
arm from Nellie's grasp. "We can't keep running, not knowing what we're
running from. Besides, whoever it is will never know I'm around. I'll take the
kayak and paddle up silently and listen and try to find out what they want.
Meanwhile, get dressed and haul in the anchor. And lock yourselves
inside."

"And you
don't think whoever it is would kick in the door if they wanted to get
in?" Nellie said, her voice rising in anger.

"No one's
going to kick the door in while I'm gone," Will said, in a firm voice.
"Just haul in the anchor and go inside."

"You're
being stubborn and unreasonable," Nellie said. "But then, maybe
you're just a typical male, thinking you're invincible."

"I'm not
going to stand here arguing," Will said, in a gruff voice. "I'm going
out there and that's that!"

"Fine! Go
ahead," Nellie cried. "But if you don't come back, what am I supposed
to do? Beyond knowing how to raise the anchor, I don't have the slightest idea
how to run this boat, never mind that I have a son to watch!"

Suddenly, Will
was angry. Angry at the situation. Angry at Nellie for loving him. Angry
because she made him want something he couldn't have. And angry because without
her, his life would never seem whole again. Turning that anger on her, he said,
"Just haul in the damn anchor and lock yourself inside." When he saw
the sheen of tears in her eyes, he sucked in a long breath, and said,
"Don't worry. I'll be back to run the boat."

"Please
don't do this, Will," Nellie cried, hanging onto his arm as he turned to
go. "Why can't we just call the police?"

"And tell
them what? That there's a boat near us and we want the police to come check it
out?" Will shrugged off Nellie's arm, then grabbed the double-ended
paddle, unhitched the kayak and slipped it into the water while holding onto
the rope attached to its bow. But before he started down the ladder, Nellie
placed her hand on his arm, and said, "Please be safe, Will. Just don't do
anything foolish. If you don't care what happens to you, then think about me. I
don't want to lose another person I care about." She kissed him on the
side of the jaw, and all he said to her, before scaling the ladder was,
"Just pull up the anchor and wait."

Will lowered
himself into the kayak and paddled silently in the direction of a faint,
intermittent point of light that was quickly becoming dim as heavy fog settled
in around him, masking the boat. But gradually the fog thinned, and a small
cruiser took form. Hearing muffled voices, he knew there were at least two men
aboard. He skirted the craft, moved toward the stern, and pulled alongside the
transom, then braced his hand against the boat while trying to listen to the
men inside. Unable to make out their words, he tied the kayak to a ladder on
the side of the cruiser and quietly climbed aboard. The fog had lifted some,
and light from inside the boat flooded the deck. Moving on silent feet, he
pressed his back to the cabin and peered inside. The men were not in view, but
he could hear their agitated voices...

"...if
they don’t go ashore we'll have to wait," one man was saying.

"We
can't," the other replied. "If we don't move soon, it'll be
discovered—"

Will stepped
closer, hoping to get a look at them.

"Did you
hear that?" one said.

"Hear
what?" the other asked.

"A
noise... Like a thump."

As
Will
scurried across the deck to where the kayak was tied, a
ray of light shot over his head. He dropped to the deck and waited.

"Give me
the gun," the man with the light said.

Will lowered
his leg over the side and braced his foot on the ladder.

"Over
there!" the other man shouted.

Light shot from
the opposite direction, flooding Will's face and blinding him. "Hold
it!" the man yelled. "Don't make any quick moves. I have a gun."

Trapped in the
light, and with a gun pointed directly at him, Will removed his foot from the
ladder and raised his hands.

"What are
you going to do with him, Nate?" Will heard the other man say.

"I don't
know," the man called Nate replied, "but we can't let him go."

Will knew, from
the timbre of their voices, that the men were old, but with the light aimed in
his eyes, he couldn't see their faces. Although he wasn't a match for a gun, if
the moment was right, he knew he could subdue two old men.

"Don't let
him come aboard," the other man said.

"We don't
have much choice," Nate replied.

"What
about the ones on the
Isadora
?"
the other man said. "If we hold the guy here, they're sure to come looking
for him."

Will caught the
shakiness in the man's voice. The old man was nervous as hell. Feeling more
confident, he said, "Well, what's it going to be?"

"Okay,
come on aboard," Nate said, "but don't do anything funny. This gun's
cocked and aimed at your head."

Will climbed
onto the deck. "That's far enough," Nate said. "Myles, get the
rope."

"What
rope?" the man called Myles asked.

"The one
tied to the crab pot."

"We don't
have that anymore," Myles said. "We left it in Campbell River."

"Here,
hold this." Nate pressed the gun into Myles's hand.

"No...
Wait!" Myles reached for Nate's arm, but Nate shrugged his hand off and
ducked into the cabin. Seeing the gun trembling in Myles's hand, Will rushed
him and raised his leg sharply, sending the gun skidding across the deck. Will
whirled around and lunged after it, grabbing it with both hands as he skid to
his belly, realizing at once it was… plastic?

Raising himself
to his feet, he waved the gun at Myles, and said, "What did you plan to do
with this?"

Myles sighed.
"We thought it would give us a chance to get away if we got caught."

"Who are
you?" Will demanded.

Before Myles
could respond, Nate stepped onto the deck, a coiled rope in his hand. Will
recognized Nate at once as someone he'd seen at the marina on several
occasions, no doubt the same old man Nellie found on the boat. "We might
as well tell him," Nate said. "He'll find out sooner or later."

Myles rubbed
his grizzled chin and heaved a heavy sigh. "I suppose," he agreed.

Nate looked at
Will. "I'm Nathan Greeley. I skippered the
Isadora
for Vernon Sinclair for over twenty years. This is my
brother, Myles."

"Why are
you following us?" Will asked.

"I left
something personal in the safe on the boat," Nate replied. "I wanted
to get it without you thinking I was trying to rob you."

Will eyed him,
dubiously. "Something personal, like what?"

Nate shrugged.
"My journal."

Will was even
more skeptical of the man. "Why didn't you simply announce who you were
and come aboard and get it?" he asked. Clearly the guy was lying. He
glanced from a weathered, whiskered face, to a lean, slightly unshaved one. A
more harmless-looking pair he couldn't imagine. Still, he suspected there was
more to it than what the old men were leading him to believe. "Where,
exactly, is the safe?" he asked, surprised that with all of the work he'd
done on the boat, he hadn't discovered it.

Nate shrugged.
"That's the problem. I couldn't find it when you were docked in Port
Townsend so we followed you to Campbell River, and as it turned out, the safe
is where it was before, behind a board inside a locker in the master stateroom.
But the boards have been nailed tight and varnished, so we couldn't get to
it."

"If you
are telling the truth," Will said, "I suppose you can come aboard.
But if you make one move toward Mrs. Reid or her son, I'll throw you both
overboard and leave you to the sharks." Will was fairly certain he'd do
just that, if Nellie or Mike were harmed.

"Mrs.
Reid?"

"Vernon
Sinclair's niece," Will clarified.

"Little
Cornelia," Nate said, his voice softening with affection. "She's
here?"

"She and
her son," Will replied. "Come on, you can meet them." He stepped
onto the deck to tie the kayak to the cruiser, and as he did, he heard the deep
throb of a diesel engine and realized there was another vessel near the
Isadora
. Concerned, he motioned for Nate
to hurry. A few minutes later, the muffled drone of the diesel engine seemed
distant, and Will was relieved that the craft was moving away.

As they headed
toward the
Isadora
, Will said,
"Did one of you follow Nellie from Oregon?"

Both men shook
their heads. Which made Will's stomach tighten. The car had been stolen, and
two boats had been following them. He already knew why one of them had, which
left the other out there, with someone aboard who had no doubt followed in a
stolen car, and who was carrying a gun.

Nate pulled the
small cruiser alongside the
Isadora
and hopped onto the deck, leaving Myles to tend the boat, while Will hoisted
the kayak aboard. After securing the kayak, Will motioned for Nate to follow.
As they approached the salon, Will caught the sound of a man's voice coming
from inside. His heart began to hammer, and a cold sweat broke on his brow.
Alarmed, he swept open the door. And stood in stunned silence.