Eden Two Read online

  Eden Two

  By

  Mike Sullivan

  Book Three of the Sam Seabury Series

  Credits Page

  Damnation Books, LLC.

  P.O. Box 3931

  Santa Rosa, CA 95402-9998

  www.damnationbooks.com

  Eden Two

  Book 3 of the Sam Seabury Series

  by Mike Sullivan

  Digital ISBN: 978-1-62929-147-5

  Print ISBN: 978-1-62929-148-2

  Cover art by: Dawné Dominique

  Edited by: Juanita Kees

  Copyright 2014 Mike Sullivan

  Printed in the United States of America

  Worldwide Electronic & Digital Rights

  Worldwide English Language Print Rights

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any form, including digital and electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the Publisher, except for brief quotes for use in reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. Characters, names, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Dedication page

  To Jerry Sullivan, my brother. Thanks for your input and all your sage advice.

  To the wonderful staff at Damnation Books. You gave me a chance, and I appreciate it.

  Chapter One

  Sam Seabury slipped out of the storm back into his cabin onboard the cargo ship, MV Sapphire. A deck crew stood by. He counted six heads.

  “Where’s Jackie?” Seabury’s voice rose an octave higher above the howling wind and turbulent seas outside. Dark brown eyes widened inside his round face.

  Able Seaman Stan Mossberg stepped forward. “Don’t know, Boats. We thought Jackie was with you.” He spoke in a thick New Jersey accent.

  Seabury raked a hand through his black, short-cropped hair. He pulled up the hood of his raincoat with thick, blunted fingers and fastened down the buttons, ready to go back out on deck. “Wait here. I’ll be back before you miss me.”

  As Seabury turned toward the door, Stan tugged his jacket. “I’ll go with you,” he said. “It’s dangerous out there. This storm’s gone hard-core. It’s the screwiest thing I’ve ever seen. The wind and rain keeps hammering our ass, night and day. Man, I can’t wait for smooth seas.”

  Seabury shook his head. “No, Stan. Thanks for volunteering,” he told him, “but you need to stay.” He glanced around the room. “Okay, ladies. Listen up. Who was the last one to see Jackie?”

  “I saw him near Number One Hold,” one of the sailors said.

  “Okay.” Seabury nodded. “I’ll start looking there.” He opened the hatch, ignoring the voices grumbling in the background. Shouts of protest filled the air.

  “Now, hold on a minute.” Seabury turned back, scanning the group with a hard, penetrating gaze. “I know all of you want to go out now and search for Jackie.” He raised a finger to his head. “But think…think for a minute. It’s too risky to have all of you out there now. The storm’s a bitch, and I’m not going to endanger the lives of my crew. It’s just the way I am,” he said. “Trust me, it’s okay. I’ll be all right. All of you, meet me in the mess hall. I’ll be back soon.”

  The crew stood in the silence, like toy statues—mute, immobile, staring at the floor. The wind howled. Rain rattled the hatch. In the dim gray light, Seabury stood composed. A calm, reassuring light entered his eyes. They worry too much, he thought.

  Seabury valued his life. He was the last person to take unnecessary risks, but this couldn’t wait. Not with the seconds ticking by, not with the thought of one of his crew out there now, God knows where, with the wind and rain pounding down on him. Thoughts of Jackie being swept overboard entered his mind, and he quickly repelled them.

  “I’ll be back before you know it,” he told the men. “ So, sit tight, and don’t worry.”

  He opened the hatch. A wave of seawater crashed across the outer edge of the hatch. A large and brawny man, Seabury ducked inside the small hatch opening and shook his way through a cloud of mist and spray to step outside. The hatch closed behind him.

  The storm darkened the June day. It raged on all around him, tearing up the ocean. He stared ahead toward the bow of the ship and walked, slowly, along the rail inside the outer passageway. One foot in front of the other, his feet trudging across the wet, slippery deck. He’d been at sea for many years since his graduation in 1999 from UC Berkeley—a careful, methodical man obsessed with being thorough. Maybe to a fault, most of his crew would agree. It would kill him to lose a man at sea.

  With a zealot’s obsession, he pushed on while thinking, My reputation’s at stake. I need to find him. He cried out into the wind and rain, “Jackie…Jackie,” bound and determined to find him. The ship rolled suddenly. Waves crashed over the side. He took hold of a skinny handrail and ducked down lower. The deluge knocked him against the bulkhead in the ship’s outer corridor. In the wind and rain, he felt his back pinned against the wall.

  A stream of saltwater squirted out the side of his mouth. His head thrown back, he grinned and spat the rest of it out. All these years left him with the same feeling he’d had the first time he’d ever set foot on a ship. It was the same feeling a young, obedient, child has for his mother. Treat the sea with a kind and gentle heart—love her, respect her, and she will respond the same way. Disrespect her, and she can take a life away at any moment. Undaunted by the storm, he pulled the hood close to his eyes and kept going.

  One foot after another, he staggered up the passageway. A wild surf, a pounding rain, deep oceanic squalls—it was all part of the territory. He called the sea his home, and nothing else mattered. Now, the sound of his black boots squished under him. Rivulets of water splashed at his feet. As the ship rolled to the side again, the rivulets vaporized into a burst of mist and spray before vanishing back over the side.

  He moved on. His feet slid awkwardly through the patches of seawater. His eyes searched the shadows ahead of him, dark and deep. No one there called out to him. No one in front or at the back of him. A moment later, he found himself calling out Jackie’s name again, “Jackie! Are you there?” hoping the seaman would respond.

  Seabury’s eyes switched back and forth, searching the distance as his mind continued to churn. It was going to be one of those days. He could feel the emotion stabbing at his heart. A day like no other. A day when everything that could possibly go wrong did. He had to find Jackie. He also had to go down into Number Two Hold after the storm let up, and that worried him. A while ago, he’d heard it…a loud crash and the sound of cargo slipping across the deck. He tried to paint a rosy picture. One of optimism, a positive mental outlook, but who was he trying to fool? In his mind’s eye, he saw it now. Cargo busted wide open. Precious artifacts smashed to pieces. Dirt and damp clay scattered all over in a wet, soggy mess. He shook his head, annoyed and frustrated. Good God, what next?

  They were a day out of Singapore onboard the Sapphire, a bulk cargo ship. GPS tracked them through the storm. Fierce winds, gigantic waves, and a pounding rain assaulted them. For the past two days, Typhoon Pamela roared across the Pacific and battered the ship like a cork bobbing up and down in a kid’s bath water. She howled north across the Andaman Sea. She skirted the western coast of Thailand and changed directions. Her powerful winds and relentless rain swept south into the Sea of Java. She lashed out at them with the power of a woman scorned.

  He reached the landing at the top of the ladder and peered into a gray space down below. Rain splattered across his yellow raincoat. It pounded his shoulders and
tore at his chest as he descended the ladder onto the forward deck. He stared bleakly through the sheets of rain, crouched low, and moved across the wind-swept deck. He stepped around the side of a cargo winch. “Jackie,” he called out, and then he saw him.

  His back wedged against a hatch cover, Jackie called out to Seabury. “I don’t think it’s broken.” One foot pressed against the winch. The other foot Jackie held by the ankle. “It’s swollen big as a balloon,” he said. Seabury squatted down near him. Jackie’s short, blocky body writhed in pain.

  “Okay,” said Seabury, getting his arm under Jackie’s armpit. “I need to get you off the deck. Can you stand up?” Jackie nodded. “Put your weight on your good foot,” Seabury said. “Lean on me, and I’ll support you.” A moment later, Jackie stood up, grimacing in pain.

  Turning back, Seabury pulled him up the ladder. One agonizing step after the other. At the top, they ducked under a wash of wind and rain, and they kept going. They hobbled along the outer deck and headed back to the mess hall near the stern of the ship. The wind rose up and lashed at them. It tore their raincoats open, ripping them forward and then back again along the deck. Jackie cried out in pain. The wet, slippery boot on his good foot slid out from under him, and Seabury caught him just in time before he slipped and fell to the deck.

  “Hold on,” Seabury said. “Rest for a while.” They had reached the outer passageway on the port side of the vessel. The wind and sea spray had let up for now. “I can carry you if the ankle gets too bad and you can’t put your weight on it,” he said.

  “Naw. It’s okay, Boats. I want to thank you,” Jackie said, staring up at Seabury with a genial look in his eyes mingled with a look of pain. “As they say in Alabama, you’re good people.”

  Seabury cracked a thin smile. “What’d you think I’d do…” he teased, “kick your ass over the side?”

  Jackie smiled at Seabury’s ribald humor. The two started up again, hobbling along the deck. The ship canted sharply to the side. Waves hurled over the side and crashed down, soaking them. Jackie shook and shivered. His teeth chattered in a painful sound inside his mouth.

  Down below, creaking sounds tore out of the ship’s hull and reached their ears. Seabury heard the noise like a fiendish cackle drift higher into the dark sky. He staggered forward, supporting the weight of Jackie’s small, compact body with his right shoulder. His feet slipped out from under him, but he quickly caught his balance. His raincoat, pressed against his chest, felt cold and wet against his clothing. Icy rain chilled his bones. Jackie and Seabury slid down the outer bulkhead. Hatch to hatch. Cabin to cabin. Unaware of the danger they were in.

  All of a sudden, the ship rolled to the side, and then it happened. The deck shot straight down and seemed to drop out from under him. Seabury tripped up and lost his balance. His legs got tangled up in Jackie’s, and before he knew it, he and Jackie hurled sideways across the deck toward the outer rail.

  Oh, God. Please…no, Seabury thought.

  He dug his heels into the deck and kept skidding. A grotesque sound tore out of his lungs as he and Jackie crashed against the rail. His chest heaved, eyes stretched wide with fear. He waited a minute until his heart rate slowed. His right arm seized Jackie’s and locked around it like the closing jaws of a vice while he clutched desperately with the other to the two steel cords forming the rail. The cords snapped back. Twanged against his chest. Now, he clung in horror to the lower one in a vice-like grip. His body jackknifed forward, his legs curled under him, pinned to a spot on the deck. He looked straight down into the dark, icy waters looming below where instant death awaited them.

  Gradually, he moved his gaze back to Jackie. “You okay?” he asked.

  “I’m, uh…I don’t know,” said Jackie, his eyes wide, his face blanched with fear.

  “We need to get out of here.” Seabury yelled above the wind and rain. “When the ship rolls the other way, we’ll make a dash for it. I’ll drag you across. Just stay loose and relax. We’ll be fine,” he said in a calm, reassuring tone. “Trust me.”

  He didn’t stand up until the ship had pitched and rolled to the other side. Then all at once, Seabury sprang to his feet and skidded across, dragging Jackie behind him with both hands until they’d reached a wooden handrail secured to the bulkhead.

  Seabury pulled Jackie to his feet. “Lean against me,” he said. “We gotta get out of here. The longer we stay out on deck, the more dangerous it is.” He glanced back across the deck and shook his head. “I don’t want a repeat performance of what just happened. My heart couldn’t take it.”

  “We were that close,” Jackie said, his body quaking as his teeth chattered.

  Seabury said nothing. He pulled Jackie along the handrail back aft toward the mess hall. His heart raced inside his chest. That was way too close, he thought as nerves jumbled beneath his skin. The wind and rain swept at his back. He and Jackie were getting closer…closer to the mess hall now. Gray clouds hung low over the ship. Streaks of lightening carved a jagged path through the gloom. The ship nosed down into the water at a steep angle. Without warning, the bow disappeared. Then moments later, a wild upward surge brought it back into view.

  Gallons of seawater tore across the deck and crashed against the mast and forward rigging. Waves roared over winches and hatch covers, and they slammed against the base of the wheelhouse. Seabury glanced back and heard another, loud horrific crash. Noise shot up from the engine room down below. Diesels revved and whined in an ear-splitting blast. Eerie sounds echoed in his ears. A grisly halo of gray light hung over the ship. It pitched up and down and ploughed alone helplessly through the dark, mysterious depths. Moments later, they reached the mess hall.

  “Did you hear that?” Stan Mossberg asked as they entered. “The ship’s gonna crack in two. We’re going under.”

  Seabury held up a hand, waved him off, and told him to stop. Jackie sat down on the end of a bed, and the men huddled around him, glad to see him safely inside.

  “I twisted it bad.” He pointed down at his right ankle. “My ankle feels like a balloon inside my boot. I have pins and needles in my leg.”

  One of his shipmates worked gingerly to ease the swollen ankle out of the boot. Another shipmate guided Jackie’s foot into a bucket of ice water. The other men huddled together, relieved to see Seabury back inside and Jackie safe as well.

  The group consisted of seven seamen, including Jackie. Four were AB seaman with two or more years’ experience at sea; the others were Ordinaries, still in their apprenticeship. While the AB’s stood watch or took the helm to steer the monstrous ship, the OB’s took care of the basics that kept it seaworthy. With each painted boom or hatch cover, they honed their shipboard skills, learning from the AB’s. It was storms like this one that tested their strength as a crew.

  In the dim light of the mess hall, Seabury cracked a faint smile. “We’re not going under,” he told Stan, “so get that idea out of your head. You guys would do anything to get out of work.” The men laughed. The humor drained tension from their faces. Harry Hooper, dubbed High Flier for his animated outbursts, spoke first. “Boat’s is right. Naw, the storm ain’t bad,” he said. “We’ll bootleg the ass end and come around the other side. We’ll be out of it in no time.”

  “Think so?” One of the sailors looked skeptical.

  “Yeah.”

  Seabury, happy his men were safe inside out of the storm, sat in silence, watching them.

  “Hey, Harry. Remind me of one thing, will yah?” asked Boots Randolph.

  “Yeah. What?” His close-set eyes narrowed as a wild, wolverine grin twisted across his mouth.

  “Ah, don’t get me started.”

  “Started on what?”

  “Your gene pool.”

  Boots liked to tease Harry, who was easily riled, and Boots never let a chance go by to upset him.

  “What about it?” Harry said, looking defensive.

  “I think your mother banged a red-headed orangutan, then you came out.”
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br />   The other sailors laughed. Harry took the first swing as Seabury flew out of his seat and separated them.

  “Cut the crap,” he ordered.

  At six-two and weighing two hundred and thirty pounds, Seabury wasn’t a man to mess with. His short, dark hair, olive skin, and small, flat nose gave him the appearance of a champion boxer. Add that to a square, granite jaw, and no one dare call him boyishly handsome. Everything about him screamed masculinity: the Spartan build and rugged, outdoor look. Eyes the color of black oak stared out at the world with strength and compassion.

  On the street, he turned heads. Women fawned over the soft, soothing sound of his baritone voice. Immediately, they fell in love with his charm and intelligence. He walked with a catlike grace. His thick neck and wide, sloping, wrestler’s shoulders created a picture of strength and power.

  Intimidated, Hooper and Randolph backed off, and they fell in line. They stood looking straight down, ready to listen.

  “Here’s the deal,” Seabury said. “We stay here and wait a while. There’s enough coffee for all of us.” He pointed to a large stainless steel urn clamped to the bulkhead in a near corner of the mess hall. A crew of cooks and kitchen helpers worked beyond a narrow window at the rear of the hall. “Help yourselves,” he said. “ We sit this thing out. Then, we’ll go below and see what damage the storm’s done in Number Two Hold.”

  He scanned the group. “I don’t want anyone talking nonsense about the ship sinking.” He tapped his forehead below a string of short, dark curls. “Get rid of that garbage. The Sapphire was built in a South Korean shipyard. This ship is one of the best built ships in the world. It’s strong enough to hold up under heavy seas.”

  Just then, the ship lurched forward. A loud crash followed by the rumble of distant noises filled the room. A wave hurled past a nearby porthole. It broke against the glass in a steamy cloud of mist and fog.