“Pete! Shut up!”
“See? Ow.” He rubbed his shoulder after Finn punched him from the backseat. “Did I mention that she has a tendency toward violence too?”
“I’ll do my best not to get on the wrong side of her. I bruise easy.”
“Hey, don’t you start too.” Finn felt the tension in her shoulders ease with the easy flow of conversation. She nearly sighed in relief.
“We’re almost there. I’m out on the early boat tomorrow with a bunch of tourists, so it’s probably best if we meet up in the afternoon to go over the game plan and do the paperwork. Is that okay?” Oz asked as she navigated her way through traffic.
“Sure. What time’s best for you?” Finn swallowed the sudden lump of fear in her throat. She wanted to do this. She knew she could do this. Nothing anyone else said mattered, and Oz could teach her what she needed to know in order to stand on her own. She met Oz’s questioning glance in the mirror, noticing her shrug slightly before she continued speaking. Finn had clearly missed whatever Oz had been saying, but Oz didn’t seem terribly fazed. Tension knotted her shoulders once again.
“I should be back at the dock around three and have the boat cleared in thirty minutes. If you come to the dive center at four, I should be about done and I can introduce you to everyone.”
“Sounds good. Is there anything I need to be reading in the meantime? Anything I can do or get?”
“Not really. We’ll sort everything out when we meet tomorrow. I’m sure you’ll be a little jet-lagged, so it’s probably best to get plenty of rest and just chill for the day. The pool at the Ocean Key is supposed to be absolutely gorgeous.” She pulled up outside the hotel entrance and walked around the car to open the boot as the bellhop arrived with a trolley. “If you ask the concierge, they’ll arrange a ride for you tomorrow. We’re not too far from the dive center, but it’s probably easiest to use the shuttle the hotel operates.” She closed the boot and turned back to them. “Pete, it was a pleasure to meet you and I’m sure I’ll see more than enough of you.” She held out her hand and sputtered when he pulled her into a fierce hug.
“You make sure you look after her. She’s special.” Pete threw an arm around Finn and hugged her close before mussing her hair. “Short people like her make me feel really tall!”
“Hey! You lanky piece of piss!”
“I told you she had a foul mouth.”
Oz shook her head. “Finn, I’ll see you tomorrow. Four o’clock.”
Finn looked her straight in the eye, determined to let Oz know she was ready and not in the least afraid. Even if it wasn’t completely true. “I can’t wait.”
William Sterling stared out his penthouse office window across the London skyline, but, as always, he didn’t see it. His focus was purely internal. He rested his hands on the slight paunch of his stomach, the pale blue shirt pulled taut across the flabby flesh. His fingers moved in time with each thought as it flittered across his mind before being dismissed. The telephone rang and snapped him from his reverie.
“Yes?”
“Mr. Sterling, Dr. Ethan Lyell is on line one.” He didn’t respond as he punched the button.
“Dr. Lyell. You have good news for me I trust.”
“Sir, I’ve created Balor. Your daughter’s work was impeccable. Without her, it wouldn’t have been possible.”
“Balor?”
“Yes, sir. I felt it appropriate—”
“From Celtic mythology?”
“Yes. Myth describes him as a cyclops able to paralyze and kill with a single glance.”
“Is that what you think of your creation, Doctor?”
“It is—”
“No matter. I trust now you’ll have some results for me on how effective the bacteria are?”
“Yes, sir. How would you like the results?”
“E-mail them to me.”
“Of course.”
“When I get the results, I’ll let you know what to do next.”
“Of course.”
“And, Doctor…”
“Sir?”
“I want a projection on how long it will take to synthesize a quantity of this stuff.”
“How large a quantity?”
“Fifty-five gallon drums. Twenty of them.” He could hear the scientist swallow on the other end of the line.
“Sir, I don’t have the equipment here to—”
“Then you had better get it, hadn’t you, Ethan? Marissa is counting on you.”
“Please, Mr. Sterling. Please don’t hurt my wife. I’m doing everything you want me to do. Please. Please let me see her. Talk to her. So I know she’s okay—”
Sterling slammed the phone back into its cradle.
“Pathetic.” He spun around in his chair and stared at the London skyline. The dingy gray clouds marred the view as he contemplated the upcoming deal. A harmless tummy bug would turn into a lethal killing machine. He mentally counted the millions of pounds riding on the back of the deal. He was already picturing his bank balance reflecting the transfer of funds.
He smiled as he recollected one of his minions bringing the discovery to his attention. The discovery made by his own daughter. The ability to incorporate toxins inside bacteria so that they reproduced and infected the host; it was absolutely priceless.
And she thought I’d only want to market the discovery to treat illnesses. So naïve. If I hadn’t had her DNA tested, I wouldn’t believe she was mine. Shame really. She has the brains to make my little empire even bigger.
He turned back to his desk and picked up the telephone.
She’s got the brains, but not the aptitude
. He punched a number on the phone and waited for his secretary to answer.
“Yes, Mr. Sterling?”
“Susan, I need you in here a moment.” He hung up the phone and watched as she stepped inside.
“What do you need, Mr. Sterling?”
He turned his chair to the side and unzipped his pants. “Take care of this, Susan.”
She clearly swallowed her revulsion and turned to close the door.
“Leave it.”
She froze. She paled and he smiled. She knew too much. Too many of his secrets were stored in that pretty little head. If she weren’t so good with her mouth, he would have dealt with her long ago. He waited, her hand on the doorknob obviously shaking.
“Is there a problem, Susan?”
She slowly turned around and crossed the room before dropping to her knees.
It wasn’t desire for her that made him hard. It was knowing that she hated doing this. It was knowing that she despised him. It was knowing that she despised working for him. But still she got down on her knees and took him in her mouth. No, it wasn’t desire. It was power. He closed his eyes and reveled in it.
At two on the dot, Finn pulled her newly purchased 1967 green ragtop Mustang into the parking lot at the back of the dive center and walked down to the dock. She could see that the boats were all still out and she smiled, glad she would be there to help with the chores common to her new profession. She found a perch on a low wall and leaned back against the trunk of a palm tree, her mind wandering as she stared out across the ocean. The waves broke gently against the dock and the jetties; the sun, hardly above its zenith, moved away behind her, casting long shadows as it marched onward.
Slowly, dots on the horizon grew into the boats heading home for the day. Closing her eyes, she imagined herself on the deck of the boat, the feel of the wind in her hair, the sea spray on her face, and the sun warming her skin. She craved the freedom she knew she would find there. She could feel the shackles that had held her in London falling away. She hadn’t even noticed as the boat finally pulled up alongside the dock and the deck hand jumped off, taking the mooring line with him and bending it around the cleats, before catching the second line and making the boat secure. A gangplank bridged the gap and people with sun-reddened cheeks and windswept hair scurried off as fast as they could, none of them wanting to hang around and feel pressured into helping unload the equipment.
She hopped off the wall and made her way the last few feet to the boat. Catching the eye of a well-built man wearing his wet suit pulled down to his waist heading away from the boat, she smiled at him.
“Hi, is Oz on this boat?”
“Yeah, but she’s probably gonna be pissed that you turned up here. She’s working and she don’t really like it when you girls show up like this. It’s probably best if you just head off home and call her later.” He put an arm around her shoulders to turn her away from the boat. “She did give you her number didn’t she?”
Finn’s eyebrows drew into a frown. “Yes, she gave me her number. I know she’s working. That’s why I’m here. I’m a bit early, but I thought—”
“Hey, Mac, go and get the cart or we’re gonna be here all day.” Finn turned to see Oz at the top of the gangplank starting to pass boxes along to a man on the dock receiving them. She gave a quick wave when she saw them talking. “Hey, Finn, you’re early. Is everything okay?”
Finn ducked under the man’s arm and headed the last few feet to the boat as he shrugged and headed away from them. “Yeah, everything’s fine. I was just a bit bored hanging around the hotel waiting, so I thought I’d come over and take a look around. Is that okay?”
“Sure.” Oz reached for another box stuffed with lead weights, masks, snorkels, BCDs, regulators, and fins, before tossing it across to the man on the dock.
“Since I’m here, can I help with anything?”
Oz’s head snapped up. “You want to help?”
Finn shrugged. “Yeah. Is that not all right?”
“It’s more than all right. It’s just unusual. This is the end most people try to duck out on.” Another box hit the dock. “When Mac gets here with the cart you can help stack the boxes so that we can get it all back to the dive center to wash it off before we store it all. Is that okay?”
Finn nodded as she turned to look in the direction Mac had gone. She began straightening the items in some of the boxes so that they would sit better atop each other without damaging any of the delicate and expensive equipment in them. By the time Mac returned, she had all the boxes ready to stack and began lifting them onto the wheeled cart.
“Finn, make sure you leave enough room for all the tanks to go on there too.”
“Will do.” Finn liked the burning in her shoulders as she stacked the equipment neatly onto the cart. Her muscles would ache the next day, but she didn’t care. Right now, the sun was shining, the birds singing, and the air was heavy with the salt of the ocean. It felt good to be active.
“So, Oz, you going to introduce us to the magic worker bee over there, or shall we just call her your mystery friend?” Mac whispered under his breath loud enough for everyone to hear, his shaved head glistening in the sunlight, his wet suit unzipped and rolled down to his waist leaving his broad chest and abs clearly visible.
“No mystery, guys. That is Daniela Finsbury-Sterling, our new zero to hero candidate.”
“That’s the chick you had to pick up at the airport last night?”
“Yup.” She grabbed some more gear and tossed it onto the dock.
“And then you drove her to her hotel?”
“Yup.”
“And then you worked the old Oz magic?”
“Knock it off, Clem. We aren’t all animals like you.”
“Very true, Oz, my friend, very true, but there are even fewer like you.”
Finn felt her cheeks flush as she tried to ignore the conversation. She kept stacking boxes, moving things around, and keeping busy. She tried not to think about Oz playing the field, though she couldn’t figure out why the thought disappointed her. She glanced at Oz, surprised to see her looking uncomfortable.
“I wasn’t talking about myself.” She didn’t hang around for him to answer but jumped onto the dock and jogged over to Finn. “You ready to roll this thing home?”
“Yep.” Finn headed around to the back of the cart and got ready to push, trying to put as much distance between her and Oz as possible.
“If this thing starts rolling backward, we’re gonna be scooping you up off the dock. Always head for the side and use the rail there.” Oz pointed to the far side of the cart. “Don’t want to squish anyone who helps unload a boat when they don’t have to.”
“Thanks. I’ll bear that in mind.” She grabbed hold of the rail and started to haul when Oz counted to three.
“So why did you really head here so early?”
“I was bored. Pete was chatting up some bartender at the cocktail bar, and I felt like I was about to become a third wheel, so I thought I’d give my new car a run out and look around. I can’t stay in the hotel for the rest of the time I’m going to be here, so I thought I should get to know the area.” She smiled over at Oz as she tried to catch her breath. “That was the plan anyway. The next thing I knew, I was sitting on the wall watching the ocean and I thought I might as well give you a hand.”
“Sorry, back up a bit. Did you say you bought a car?”
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Well, I’ll need it to get around. I don’t imagine I’ll be able to get a place close enough to the dive center to be able to walk here every day with any gear I might have to haul with me, and while I don’t mind working hard, doing so just for the sake of it seems stupid.”
“So what kind of car did you get? A junker to run around in?”
“Erm, no, not really.” For a moment, Finn felt silly for buying such a nice car when she’d be spending most of her time in the water. But just as quickly, she let the feeling go. She wanted something nice, something she could enjoy without anyone to condemn her.
Oz steered the cart to the back of the shop and they pulled it to a stop.
“We need to get all the equipment rinsed off so the salt water doesn’t do too much damage. The easiest way is to dunk it all in these tubs.” Oz pointed to the two giant vats filled with water. “We use the one on the left for the first clean then the second one as a final rinse. Just throw all the wet suits and BCDs in first. The salt takes a little while to leach out of the fabric.” She grabbed an armful of wet neoprene before hauling it over the edge of the tub and watching as Finn followed her example. “So?”
“So?”
“The car?”
“Why? Do you have a thing for cars?”
“Yes. Now tell me.”