Skeleton Coast

Juan knew, however, that even with all of these ships streaming in to search for the tanker, theOregon , with her superior speed, would be the first to reach the edge of the storm and it would fall on his shoulders to stop Daniel Singer.

SLOANE Macintyre weaved down the passageway carrying a di

She set the tray on the carpeted deck and cracked open the door. She could see dim lighting from inside.

“Juan,” she called softly and retrieved the tray. “You weren’t at di

She stepped over the threshold, not yet feeling that she was intruding. A lamp spilled a pool of light across half of Cabrillo’s desk. The other half was blushed with the muted glow of a computer monitor.

The chair was pushed back as if Juan had just gotten up from working but he wasn’t at the file cabinet or the antique safe. The sofa tucked under a darkened porthole was empty.

She set the tray on the desk and said his name again as she approached his dim bedroom. He lay facedown on the bed and before Sloane took in the whole picture she looked away, thinking he was nude. When she peeked back shyly she saw he wore a pair of boxer shorts nearly the same color as his skin, though a crescent of pale white showed above the boxer’s waistband. Then she feared he wasn’t breathing until his chest expanded like a bellows.

For the first time she allowed herself to stare at his stump. The skin was red and puckered and looked raw, no doubt from all the fighting he’d been involved in. The muscles of his upper legs were large and even in sleep they didn’t seem relaxed. In fact, none of him did. His whole body was tensed. She held her breath to listen carefully and heard his teeth grinding together.

His back was a patchwork of old scars and new bruises. There were six identical marks that looked as though he’d taken a shotgun blast and what she hoped was a healed surgical incision and not a knife wound because it began just over his kidney and disappeared under his shorts.

His clothing had been tossed onto the floor and as she folded it, she wondered what kind of man would pay such a heavy price to do what he did. He gave no outward sign that at night his dreams gave him a case of bruxism that sounded like he was going to pulverize his teeth. And although he was barely in his forties, he had accumulated two lifetime’s worth of scars. Some force drove him to put himself in danger despite the cumulative effects it was having on his body.

It wasn’t a suicide wish, of that she was sure. She could tell by his easy banter with Max and the others that Juan Cabrillo loved life more than anyone. And maybe that was it. He had put it upon himself to make certain others had the opportunity to enjoy their lives as much as he did. He had made himself a protector even if those he looked after would never know of his efforts. She thought back to their conversation about what he would be if not the captain of theOregon . He’d said a paramedic, an unsung hero if ever there was one.

When she draped his pants over a wooden valet, his wallet fell to the floor.

Sloane looked over at Juan. He hadn’t moved a muscle. Feeling a twinge of guilt, but not enough to overcome her curiosity, she opened the wallet. All it contained was cash in a variety of currencies. No credit cards, no business cards, nothing to identify him in any way. She should have known. He wouldn’t carry around anything that could link him back to his ship or give his enemies information about who he really was.

Sloane looked over to the office, where the lighting made his desk seem to dominate the space. She padded silently to it, glancing in his direction again before gently tugging open the middle drawer. This is where Cabrillo kept himself. She found a gold and onyx Dunhill lighter and an ornate cigar cutter. She found his American passport and saw nearly every page had been stamped. She preferred his hair short like he kept it now versus the photo taken six years earlier. There were two more U.S. passports, one with the picture of a great slob of a man named Jeddediah Smith, and it took her a moment to realize it was Juan in disguise. There were others from various countries and under different aliases, as well as matching credit cards for all the personas, and shipmaster’s licenses for both Juan and his Smith character. She found a gold pocket watch inscribed to Hector Cabrillo from Rosa and suspected it belonged to his grandfather. Amid the bric-a-brac were a few letters from his parents, his old CIA ID

tag, a small four-barreled antique pistol like a riverboat gambler might carry, an ivory-handled magnifying glass, and a rusted Cub Scout pocketknife.

Toward the back of the drawer was an inlaid Turkish box and inside she made a discovery she never expected—a gold wedding band. It was a simple pipe-cut ring, and judging by how little it was scratched, Sloane thought it hadn’t been worn much. She wondered what stupid woman had let a man like Juan get away. They were one in a million and if you were lucky enough to find one you did whatever it took to make it work. She looked more carefully into the box and saw a piece of paper folded so it completely covered the bottom.

She was on the cusp between snooping and prying and glanced over her shoulder to where Juan was sleeping before reaching for the slip of paper. It was a police report of a single-car accident in Falls Church, Virginia, that had claimed the life of Amy Cabrillo. Tears pricked Sloane’s eyes. As she read through the dry report she learned that Juan’s wife’s blood alcohol level was nearly three times the legal limit.

A man like Juan would marry once in his life, to the woman he felt certain he could grow old with. The fact that this woman had taken that from him made Sloane hate her all the more. She wiped at her cheek and carefully refolded the report and set everything back into the drawer the way she’d found it. She picked up the tray of food and retreated from the cabin.

Linda Ross rounded a corner just as Sloane got the door closed.

“Hi, roomie,” Sloane said quickly to cover her embarrassment. “I didn’t see Juan at di

“Is that why you’re crying?”

“I…” Sloane could say nothing more.

Linda smiled warmly. “Don’t worry about it. It’ll be our secret. For what it’s worth he’s probably the best man I’ve ever met.”

“Have you and he?”

“I’ll admit he’s as handsome as the devil and the thought crossed my mind when I first came aboard; but no we haven’t and never will. He’s my commander and my friend and both are too important to screw up with an affair.”

“But that’s all it’ll ever be, isn’t it? I sense he’s a one-woman man and any opportunity has passed.”

“You know about Amy?”

“I was snooping and saw the police report.”

“Don’t tell Juan you saw that. He doesn’t think any of the crew knows he’s a widower. Max made the mistake of telling Maurice once and, well, Maurice gossips like an old woman. And yeah, it would probably only be a short-term thing but not because he’s in mourning over Amy. He’s got another love, one no woman can compete with.”

“TheOregon .”

Linda nodded. “So think through what you want to do before you do anything.”

“Thanks.”

As they walked away Juan’s cabin door opened slowly and he peered down the corridor. The sound of his desk drawer opening had wakened him but he’d feigned sleep so as not to embarrass Sloane. He would have to talk to Max about his inability to keep a secret and Maurice, too, for that matter. He closed the door again, thinking that what he overheard made a decision he’d been contemplating a bit more difficult.