3 Dark Horse (EBOOK)

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CHAPTER 1
Key Largo, Florida

Ryan Weller climbed out of the water and stood on the deck of the Newton 46 dive boat. He was one of twenty other divers on the cattle run to the wreck of the USS Spiegel Grove. He walked forward to the small cabin, unclipped the two bailout bottles, set them in the tank rack, and finally slipped the rebreather off his shoulders. After easing the device to the deck, he checked it over before stowing it under the boat’s built-in bench seat.
Next, Ryan peeled off his three-millimeter-thick wetsuit. He wore compression shorts underneath and pulled gray boardshorts over them. After he shoved his wetsuit, mask, gloves, fins, boots, computers, and compass into his dive bag, he climbed up to the bridge with a cold bottle of water and stood beside the captain. Stacey Coleman was a short girl with wide hips, small breasts, purple hair, and several piercings in her ears, nose, and upper lip.
“Have a good dive?” she asked.
“Terrific, Stacey. How can they be bad on a day like this?” He spread his hands to encompass what they called Lake Atlantic on days when the ocean was mirror-flat, the current nonexistent, and visibility exceeded seventy-five feet.
“Days like this make me wish I was diving instead of driving the boat.”
“Are you driving this afternoon?”
Stacey stuck her lip out in a pout. “Yes, I’m taking forty-five snorkelers to the Christ of the Abyss statue.”
“That doesn’t sound like fun.” He took a long drink of water.
“It’s better than sitting in the office. Why aren’t you teaching today?”
“I took the day off. Speaking of which, can I borrow your car to run down to Stock Island?”
“You can’t borrow Mark’s?” Stacey asked, referring to Mark Lester, Ryan’s roommate and fellow instructor at the dive facility.
“He’s using it today.”
Stacey turned up the stereo. Queen’s ‘Fat Bottomed Girls’ reverberated off the water. She cocked a hip and grinned lasciviously at Ryan.
He gave a half smile and shook his head. It was a game they played. Neither of them took it seriously enough to move past the overt flirting.
Sweat trickled down Ryan’s back as the sun bore down on them. He adjusted his sunglasses, took a swig of water, and absently watched the other divers climb back onto the boat. They’d done a double dip, two dives on the Spiegel instead of a single dive, before moving to another location. The double dip had allowed him to do a longer, forty-minute decompression dive instead of the two standard twenty-minute dives. He’d entered the water with the other divers on their first dip and surfaced before they’d completed their second.
Ryan had also surfaced because his mind wasn’t on the dive. When his mind wandered to other pursuits while underwater, it was time to head back to the boat. He had no desire to die from complacency. His mind filled with memories of twenty-five million dollars in gold bars in a sunken ship off the coast of Haiti. Even sitting beside Stacey, he could see in his mind the gleaming gold bricks in the ship’s hold.
Queen morphed into Zac Brown. Two or three people began singing along with ‘Toes.’ Ryan tapped his foot and hummed the “I got my toes in the water …” lyrics.
Stacey grabbed a clipboard and headed down the ladder. She began calling out the names of the divers to ensure everyone was back on the boat. With the roll call complete, she returned to the bridge and cranked up the diesel engine. It eagerly snorted to life. She edged the boat forward, allowing the crewman to release the boat’s bridle from the mooring ball.
Ryan finished the water and crushed the bottle flat before screwing the cap back on. He watched Stacey spin the boat’s wheel, swinging the bow around to face Key Largo. She shoved the throttle forward, and the big Newton came up on plane.
Thirty minutes later, Ryan watched the multi-million-dollar houses slide past while they idled up the Port Largo channel. Most of the homes were empty this time of year. Some still had hurricane shutters bolted in place, and others had unrepaired storm damage. Occasionally, maintenance workers mowed lawns, trimmed bushes, or made improvements.
The boat made the blind left-hand turn, known as “Crash Corner,” and continued past marinas, more homes, hotels, and other dive charter services. Stacey spun the Newton one-hundred-and-eighty degrees and eased it alongside the dive shop’s dock. Crewmen tied the lines fast. She cut off the motors, climbed down to the main deck, spoke to the divers about tipping their guides, and invited them back to dive again.
Ryan carried his gear off the boat and set it on a picnic table. He turned back to the Newton. Stacey and her crew were busy refilling scuba tanks and preparing the dive boat for the afternoon run.
“Hey, Stacey,” Ryan called.
“Yeah?” She glanced up.
“Can I borrow your car?”
She laughed. “You really need to get a life, Ryan.”
The tide was out, and the boat was much lower than the dock. Ryan placed his hands on the bridge deck and leaned under it to see her adjusting the fill whip on a tank near the boat’s cabin door. “You’re right, but I still need to run down to Stock Island.”
Stacey climbed the steps off the boat and stopped in front of Ryan. He was six feet tall, and the top of her head barely reached his chest. “You might be all sexy with your sun-bleached brown hair and your green eyes, but this beach bum thing you got going is kind of a turn-off.”
He grinned. “Thanks.”
“It wasn’t a compliment.”
“I’ll take you out to dinner,” he offered.
“Are you asking me on a date?”
“No, just to thank you for borrowing the car.”
“You’re an idiot.”
“Most of the time.” Ryan shrugged. “Stacey, do you want to go on a date?” He’d avoided getting involved with anyone because the job was only temporary until he figured out how to remove the bounty a Mexican drug lord had put on him, or he decided it was time to go for the gold. The bounty wasn’t going away. It was time to nurse the gold fever.
She rolled her eyes before handing him her car keys. Smiling, she said, “Make sure you fill the tank.”
Ryan took the keys and shoved them into his pocket. “Thanks, Stace.”
“Call me if you’ll be late.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He snapped to attention and saluted.
“Asshole,” Stacey muttered, stepping down into the boat.
Ryan gathered his gear, rinsed it in the freshwater buckets, and crammed it into the back of Stacey’s Kia Rio. He drove south on Highway 1 to a small apartment complex, parked the car, and carried his equipment inside. After a quick shower, Ryan pulled on cargo shorts, a polo shirt, and deck shoes. He grabbed a sandwich and a Mountain Dew and shoehorned himself back in the car for the drive south, searching for the perfect boat to use to recover the gold.