Critical

"Good point," Dr. Flanagan said. "A very good point."

16

"Hey, asshole!" Carlo called while giving Bre

Bre

"I think our charges are returning to port," Carlo said. "Front and center!" He'd spent a year and a half in the armed forces before earning a dishonorable discharge. He'd hated the regimented experience, but he still indulged in the phraseology on occasion.

Bre

"I don't see them," Bre

"How many boats have we seen go in and out tonight?"

"You still don't know it's them," Bre

"How do I know?"

"What are we going to do?"

"We're going to sit here and watch them leave and see if they are still accompanied by the young lady. Then we are going to take a look at their boat."

It seemed to take forever as the boat backed into its slip and Franco and Angelo made it secure. When it was finally done, the two men walked along the pier toward dry land.

Carlo put down his window. Even from the distance, Carlo and Bre

"It must have been quite a boat ride."

"At the girl's expense," Carlo commented as he started the car. "What a couple of pigs."

"It doesn't make much sense. I wonder who she was. Why all the effort? She certainly didn't look like anything special."

"It doesn't make sense to us, but maybe Louie can make sense out of it," Carlo said. Then, turning to Bre

"I always do."

"Let's take a quick look around the inside of the Full Speed Ahead, if you can manage the door and the alarm system."

"I'll manage them," Bre

Carlo re-parked in approximately the same place Franco's car had been. He took a flashlight from the dash before he and Bre

"Want me to run back and move the car?"

Carlo shook his head. "Let's just keep a sharp eye out for headlights. We'd have a lot of warning. It's not like this is the only boat on the pier."

They boarded the yacht quickly. "Start on the door," Carlo said. "I'll keep an eye out."

"Posh boat," Bre

"Three guesses and the first two don't count, lunkhead."

Bre

"What do you think?" Carlo asked. He was sitting on the gunwale at the very stern where he had a good view of the approach into the marina, as well as the entire parking lot.

"A piece of cake," Bre

Carlo used his handheld light to quickly scan the interior of the main saloon. He pointed to the glasses on the bar. "So they were drinking. Explains their mood."

"What if we find the girl? What are we going to do?"

"We'll have to improvise." His light found the steps and the gangway forward. After taking another look up at the entranceway into the marina, which he could barely see, thanks to the neighboring boat, which was almost as large as the one they were on, Carlo led the way down the stairs and into the galley and dining area. Moving quickly to avoid being out of sight of land, they crossed the galley into the gangway leading forward. Carlo briefly tried each door, but the staterooms were all empty and undisturbed until they came to the last one. In it, the queen-sized bed cover was in disarray, as was a towel on its surface.

"I'd say this was the scene of the crime," Carlo said. He shone the light around the room, which was otherwise totally shipshape. "The girl's gone. That's what we came here to find out, so now let's blow."

They rapidly backtracked. Carlo didn't feel comfortable until he had a reasonable view of the marina and the parking area at the boat's stern. All was serene. He turned back to Bre

"Easy" Bre

"The second one," Carlo said, warming to the idea.

"No sweat. We can put a thing about the size of a deck of cards someplace here on the boat and then set up a situation where we can follow it on the Internet."

"Good. Let's run it by Louie first."

"AH, COME ON," Angelo pleaded. "It's not that much out of the way."

"But it's going to midnight, and I'm exhausted," Franco said.

They were in the Lincoln Tu

"I want to stop at the Neapolitan," Franco continued. "The party will be breaking up soon, and I'd like a chance to make sure Vi

"It's only twenty blocks out the way I just want to see if she still lives in the same place, because if she does, the job will be a piece of cake. You can't believe how much I'm looking forward to getting some revenge. I've done two stints in the slammer for that bitch, got coldcocked by her damn boyfriend, and she's the one responsible for my face looking the way it does."

Franco glanced over at Angelo in the half-light of the car. He'd become accustomed to Angelo's horrific facial scarring. He wondered if it were his own face, would he ever get used to it?

"What would it take?" Angelo said. "Ten minutes, fifteen at most."