co-owner of the shop and dive master on the Sally Jane, stood in the boat, snapping a diving cylinder into white plastic tank holders. On the dock, a cart with one more cylinder waited nearby. Ben dropped his backpack on the pier and grabbed it. When Tyler turned around, Ben handed the tank into the boat.
“Hey, man. You’re here early.” Ben nodded at the nineteen cylinders already secured. “I would have helped if you’d just waited a minute.”
“No problem,” Tyler assured him. “I wanted to get a jump on the day. Now that you’re here, could you grab the weight belts? We’ve got eight divers this morning, all renting equipment.”
“Sure thing.”
Ben scooped up his backpack and tossed it onto the empty metal cart. He started toward the shop, pulling the cart behind him.
“Oh, yeah,” Tyler said. “When I came in this morning there was an envelope on the floor. Had your name on it.”
Ben stopped. Though the early morning sun was already working overtime to warm the air, a chill cooled his core. He turned. “My name?”
Tyler nodded, unconcerned. “Somebody must have shoved it under the door. It’s on the counter.”
Without another word, Ben hurried toward the shop. He left the cart in the center of the floor while he scooped up a manila envelope from the edge of the counter. Careful block letters spelled out his name in blue ink.
Fingers trembling, Ben bent open the metal clasp and unfolded the flap. A single piece of paper had been slipped inside. A sentence of Spanish scrawled expansively across one side.
Tráigalo al Mallory Square en la puesta del sol.
The second note in two days, but this one had the unmistakable sound of a demand. Bring it to Mallory Square at sunset. No doubt what it the note referred to.
Ben turned the paper over to look at the back side. When he did, his heart skidded to a stop.
The door behind him opened. He whirled, and then leaped forward to grip Tyler’s shoulder. “Can you handle the morning dive without me?” He hadn’t meant to shout, but his voice filled the small dive shop.
Tyler’s eyebrows arched. “Sure, Ben. I’ll give Jason a call. He can always step in on short notice.” Concern colored his boss’s features. “Is everything all right?”
“Yeah. No.” Ben shook his head. “I don’t know. I’ve got to go.”
He scooped up his backpack and shoved the door open with his shoulder. He stuffed the paper in the pack as he sprinted down the pier toward his bicycle.
Nikki’s resort was located near the center of the four-mile-long island. Ben arrived there in a matter of minutes. He didn’t bother bringing the bike to a stop before jumping off in front of Building C. By the time the bike hit the side of the building and came to an abrupt halt in a flowering shrub, Ben was already beating a fist against Nikki’s door.
“Nikki, it’s Ben.” When she didn’t appear immediately, he pounded the wood harder. “Come on, Nikki. Open the door.”
A sound came from inside. A scrape, and then the dead bolt turning. The door opened inward. Nikki stood inside wearing a pair of stretchy sweats and a rumpled T-shirt, a blue coffee mug in one hand.
Her lips twisted sideways. “This is becoming a habit, Ben.”
Relief washed over him. She was okay. With an effort, he restrained himself from wrapping his arms around her in a protective hug. Instead, he took a step forward.
She didn’t move. Her hair, inches from his nose, smelled of soap and flowers. A clean smell, outdoorsy and fresh.
“May I come in?” Her head started to shake, but he spoke again quickly, before she could deny him. “Please, Nikki. I need to tell you something important.”
Her sigh delivered a whiff of coffee-scented breath before she stepped back. “All right, but I don’t have long.”
He brushed past her and edged around a chair in the entry. What in the world? When she closed the door and turned around, she saw him looking at it.
“I, uh, propped it under the door handle last night.” A flush colored her cheeks. “You had me pretty spooked.”
“Good. You should be.”
He entered the condo and plopped his backpack down on the breakfast counter. She went into the kitchen and stood on the other side, watching him with a cautious tilt to her head.
“I’d just about convinced myself that you were right, that you being here is nothing more than a coincidence.” No need to mention his night spent outside her door. He slid the pack’s zipper open and pulled out the paper. “Until I found this waiting for me at the dive shop this morning.”
Nikki held his gaze as she took the paper. When she looked down, she gasped. Color drained from her face. “It’s a picture of me. This…this was taken last night.”
Ben looked at the black-and-white photo. It had been printed on regular paper by a computer printer. Even so, the quality was quite good, not grainy at all. In it, Nikki reclined on a lawn chair, a cell phone held to her ear. Her lips curved into an attractive half smile, and her eyes held a faraway look, her attention focused on whomever was on the other side of that phone. A stab of jealousy surprised Ben. Who commanded her attention so thoroughly?
He shook away the question. Behind her in the photograph, the patio door stood open. Through it, he glimpsed familiar-looking furniture. A quick look over his shoulder verified his guess. The picture was taken here, just outside on the patio.
“I thought so.”
“I…I heard it. The camera.” She closed her eyes briefly, then opened them and gave a shaky nod. “I remember hearing a noise that sounded familiar, but I couldn’t place what it was. Now I know. It was the sound of a camera taking a picture.”
“There’s more.”
He took the paper from her and turned it over to let her read the note on the back. Her eyelids narrowed as she translated, then looked up at him.
“What are they talking about, Ben? What do you have that these people want?”
“Nothing.” His protest met a stony expression. He spread his hands. “Honest, I don’t have it.” He swallowed and lowered his eyes. “I did have it. Briefly. But they don’t know that.”
She crossed her arms. “Don’t play games with me, Ben. Just tell me. What is it?”
For the span of a few seconds, they indulged in a stareathon that he had no chance of winning. Nikki wasn’t about to back down until he came clean with her. Ben filled his lungs and blew the air out slowly. She had a right to know, especially since she’d been dragged into the situation against her will.
He slid the paper toward him and folded it over and over, mostly for something to occupy his hands while he told her about the night Sergio Perez Rueda was killed on a Cozumel beach not far from Ben’s apartment. Then he described how he’d found the flash drive wedged in the tank of his toilet the next morning. Nikki’s eyes widened appreciatively when he told her how he’d discovered that Sergio was a known associate of the Reynosa drug cartel. She had spent enough time in Mexico to know exactly how alarming that was.
“And what was on the flash drive?” she asked.
He pressed one last fold in the paper and avoided her eyes. “I didn’t look.”
A movement forced his gaze upward. She stood with her hands on her hips, shaking her head. “I know you better than that, Ben Dearinger. The curiosity would have driven you nuts. You looked.”
He conceded with a dip of his head. She did know him well. “Okay, okay. I looked. But believe me, I wish I hadn’t. The information on that drive was…” He selected a word carefully. “Incriminating.”