Chapter 5 - Deck Fifteen
The cabin steward’s name was Tomas Alvarez.
He was twenty-seven.
Married.
Two daughters in Manila.
He regained consciousness in the medical center shortly before dawn.
I wasn’t allowed to see him.
Vale was.
When he returned, he looked grim.
“Walter offered him money.”
“How much?”
“Fifty thousand dollars.”
“For what?”
“To remove the hidden camera after the incident.”
My stomach tightened.
“Tomas refused?”
“Yes.”
“And Walter attacked him?”
“Tomas says Gregory did.”
“So they were together.”
“At least fifteen minutes ago.”
“Where?”
Vale unfolded a deck map.
“Near emergency boat station six.”
I studied the layout.
Service stairs.
Restricted corridors.
Crew-only access.
“Why lifeboats?”
Vale shook his head.
“We don’t know.”
I did not believe him.
“Marcus.”
He looked at me.
“What aren’t you telling me?”
Officer Ramirez glanced toward him.
Vale exhaled.
“A maintenance crew found a bag near station six.”
“What was inside?”
“Clothing.”
“Whose?”
“Men’s.”
“Anything else?”
“A wallet belonging to Walter Hartman.”
I understood instantly.
“He wants you to think he went overboard.”
“That’s one possibility.”
“No.”
My certainty surprised both of them.
“Walter plans everything. If he wanted to escape detection, he wouldn’t leave his wallet where crew could find it unless he wanted you to find it.”
Vale watched me.
“So what is he doing?”
“Creating another story.”
Just like the cabin.
Just like Leah.
Just like me.
Walter did not react to reality.
He wrote a version first and forced everyone else to live inside it.
“What happens if everyone believes he jumped?”
Vale’s face hardened.
“We reduce the search for a hidden passenger.”
“Exactly.”
Another thought came.
“Does Walter own businesses connected to maritime security?”
Vale frowned.
“Why?”
“Because someone opened a restricted corridor for Gregory.”
He made a call.
Ten minutes later he had an answer.
A subcontractor.
Blue Meridian Maritime.
It supplied electronic access systems to three ships in the cruise fleet.
One of its minority investors was Northstar Capital.
Walter’s company.
I almost laughed.
Of course.
He hadn’t hacked the ship.
He had bought familiarity with its systems years earlier.
Vale issued an immediate order to disable compromised access credentials.
The ship began moving toward Nassau.
Not because the cruise was continuing.
Because authorities were waiting there.
At 5:42 a.m., Dana called.
“Ash, I stopped the board vote.”
Relief hit me for the first time all night.
“How?”
“Emergency injunction request and notice to every director that your authorization may have been procured through fraud.”
“Walter?”
“His lawyers are already responding.”
“From where?”
“New York.”
I stared at the ocean.
“He planned legal cover before he boarded.”
“Yes.”
“Anything else?”
Dana went quiet.
“Your company’s chief financial officer has resigned.”
I turned.
“What?”
“Effective immediately.”
“Evan?”
“Yes.”
Evan Brooks had worked beside me for seven years.
He had been at my wedding.
He had hugged Gregory.
He had cried during the speeches.
“Why?”
“He sent the board a letter claiming you’ve displayed increasingly unstable behavior.”
The pain landed differently from Gregory’s betrayal.
Gregory had been a lie.
Evan had been real.
Or I had believed he was.
“What examples?”
“Anger. Paranoia. Aggressive decision-making.”
“All fabricated?”
“Some are distorted versions of actual meetings.”
I remembered arguments over the Northstar merger.
I had been furious because the valuation was insulting.
Evan had called me stubborn.
Now stubbornness had become instability.
“Did he mention my military service?”
“Yes.”
I closed my eyes.
There it was.
The trap expanding beyond the ship.
Gregory didn’t need to win inside the cabin if Walter could destroy my credibility outside it.
“Dana.”
“Yes?”
“Follow the money.”
“I already am.”
Her keyboard clicked.
“Evan received a consulting payment from a Northstar affiliate eleven days ago.”
“How much?”
“Eight hundred thousand dollars.”
I felt nothing.
That was worse than anger.
“Send it to the board.”
“Done.”
A security alarm suddenly sounded.
Not the general ship alarm.
A local alarm from the corridor.
Officer Ramirez moved instantly.
“Stay here.”
She opened the door.
Two guards ran past.
Vale’s radio erupted.
“Medical supply room breach.”
My head snapped up.
The champagne.
The sedative.
Walter needed drugs to complete whatever came next.
Vale ordered me into the bedroom and shut the connecting door.
I waited.
Thirty seconds.
One minute.
Two.
Then I heard something from the balcony.
A faint scrape.
Metal against metal.
I turned.
The curtains moved.
The balcony door was supposed to be locked.
It wasn’t.
It opened slowly.
Gregory stepped inside.
His shirt was torn.
There was blood near his collar.
Not much.
Enough to look frightening.
He carried no bat.
No gun.
Nothing.
Which made him more dangerous.
I moved backward.
“How did you find me?”
Gregory smiled.
“My father chose this suite.”
My stomach dropped.
Of course he had.
The “protected” cabin had been selected from a list.
Walter had anticipated even that.
Gregory closed the balcony door behind him.
“You ruined everything.”
“No.”
I kept my breathing steady.
“You did that yourself.”
“Do you have any idea what my father sacrificed for this?”
I almost laughed.
“You brought a bat into your honeymoon suite and you’re talking about sacrifice?”
His face twisted.
“You were supposed to cooperate.”
“With being assaulted?”
“With the marriage.”
There it was again.
Not love.
Ownership.
He moved closer.
“Where’s your phone?”
I said nothing.
“Ashlynn.”
He lowered his voice.
“Give me the phone.”
“No.”
“You don’t understand.”
“I understand you perfectly now.”
He lunged.
I moved sideways.
But Gregory wasn’t trying to hit me.
He grabbed the curtain and ripped it down.
Behind it was a small black case taped beneath the balcony rail.
I stared.
“What is that?”
Gregory tore it free.
“Insurance.”
He opened the case.
Inside were passports.
Cash.
A satellite phone.
And two crew identification cards.
Walter had prepared an escape route.
Gregory took one card.
Then stopped.
His expression changed.
The second card was missing.
“My father took it.”
I understood.
Walter had never intended to escape with Gregory.
Gregory understood it at the same moment.
For the first time, I saw something genuine on his face.
Fear.
“My father wouldn’t leave me.”
I looked at him.
“Wouldn’t he?”
Gregory stared at the empty slot.
Every lie he believed about Walter seemed to crack at once.
Then his satellite phone rang.
He answered.
“Dad?”
I couldn’t hear the response.
But Gregory’s face drained of color.
“What do you mean?”
Silence.
“No.”
More silence.
“You said we were leaving together.”
His hand began shaking.
Then Walter apparently said something that destroyed whatever remained of Gregory’s confidence.
Gregory whispered,
“I’m your son.”
The line went dead.
He stared at the phone.
I heard security pounding on the outer door.
Gregory looked toward me.
Then down at the black case.
May you like
And finally he said the words I had never expected to hear.
“He set me up too.”
