The Boat Man

Chapter 6

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"Morning Daddy." Brook greeted her father as he navigated the creaky, overly steep steps that led down from his apartment upstairs. "Morning hun, love ya." Since Brook had moved down to work in the restaurant he'd made a point to end almost every sentence with "lova ya." It was his way of making up for time lost when he was away. He did love her though. He'd wished she would have gone to college but he wasn't sure that college could measure up to her obvious intellect. She was smart, smarter than just about anyone he knew. He was fine with just the way things were at this moment. She was here with him, she lived nearby and he loved seeing her every day. No, He would not press the typical "fatherly" subjects of going to school, getting a good job, getting married to a wealthy husband that can turn her into a house wife droid, no he liked it just the way it was at the moment. After a brief pause, he gently kissed his daughters forehead and headed toward the parking lot. As he opened the front door to the lot he peered over at the marina and was surprised to not see Rusty Blackwell stocking bait or throwing up last nights alcohol intake. The sun was already turning the light mist of the morning into the sauna of midday.  It would be hot and sticky. A climate that he'd become accustomed to and honestly enjoyed. He paused as Don Mcreedy came around the corner, revving the engine of his pick up as to entice Frank to a duel. "Mornin Frank." Don cheerfully shouted albeit a little sarcastically. "Another B E A U T I F UL day in paradise ay." "Mornin Don, yeah as beautiful as the pelican shit that just splatted on your roof." Don's face went cold. "You've got to be shitting me, already? I haven't been here 30 seconds." Frank took advantage of his somewhat light mood this morning. "Not shitting you, pelican beat me to it."

Don had taken up residence a few miles away on the intercoastal in a tiny bungalow. Don was more or less at home on the water. He'd spent numerous hours on the Chesapeake Bay as a kid fishing, hunting, wake boarding, and skinny dipping. Don had become accustomed to living on the water and in fact, he loved it. He liked going out on the porch of his little bungalow in the morning, taking photos and having his coffee, or (more often than not) finishing a beer at night and peering out at the serenity that the flora, fauna, and birdlife provided on his little stretch of paradise. He had been working with Frank since the day they met. They had scoured the lower eastern half of the US for almost a decade now. Their latest dealings together landed them in this serene Florida town where Don felt more at home than any other place they had traveled before. They were set up as restaurateurs, given lodging, and set up to monitor the surrounding areas from three separate vantage areas. The marina, so they could monitor coastal activity. The warehouse, so they could focus centrally, inland. And finally, their seafood vendors whose sites were all over the state and they could check on product "quality" whenever they chose, giving them a panoramic view of the land. They had won some and lost some recently. Regardless, of the outcome however, Frank and Don had always been able to locate a suspect handed to them from APEX. Whether they were given the go ahead for the extraction from Mr. Wade or told to stand down and to allow some local, idiot cop to get the keys to the city and a future in politics. They would have won them all at this point if local authorities weren't given "a bone" every so often. In cases where the extraction went to local agencies, Frank and Don would be given another suspect, pick up, strap their boots on and get to it. Ever since the day The Boat Man's file flopped on Wade's desk, they had wanted him. To track him, find him, and extract him. There were others in the last 8 years that occupied their time. But it was the boat man they wanted and regardless of whatever extraction they were focusing on, he was never far from thought. They detailed files, topography of potential strike points, sketches of a potential description, police reports from open cases or cold that "could" be the work of the boat man. They were dedicated. Dedicated to extracting this vile thing that corrupted and controlled every decision they made. They would split up in assignments on every case to ensure that the boat man had constant attention. The way parent's often split duty. However, when they found him it would not be the hug of a parent who'd missed time with their child. It would be an embrace from two people who knew human pain and suffering, who knew what one man could do to another, and who knew the call of death and despair perhaps even better than the boat man himself.