Cruise Control Page 5

  “Perhaps I overestimated myself.”

  “Perhaps you did.”

  Anastasia pushed the door to the safe closed and locked it. Then she looked at me.

  “I assume you will stay here and stand guard?”

  “I think the room is safe enough,” I said.

  “As do I. Which makes me wonder what we are paying you for.”

  “Reassurance.”

  She gave me a look like she had just bitten her tongue and then stepped out from the counter. Frederick picked up his travel bag so that he looked like everyone else and offered his wife his arm. She looped her arm through his, which felt like an oddly romantic gesture, and they walked away.

  Chapter Seven

  We didn’t go back to our suite to change for the opening. I didn’t have anything much different to change into short of a tux—and that seemed like overkill—and our sardine can of a room didn’t exactly call out to us as a place to be.

  I’m a private investigator. I’m good at finding things. So I found a bar. It was an indoor/outdoor kind of place, but that was where the similarities with Longboard Kelly’s began and ended. They served all manner of fruity drinks and no stools cluttered up the bar area. We took our drinks and found a high table where we could look over the shipping containers on the dock. We didn’t feel the ship cast off, but the containers began moving away from us, signaling the start of our Caribbean voyage. A loudspeaker announced that the welcome ceremony would be taking place in an hour in the Dolphin Amphitheater, followed by the opening reception and the opening of the buffet. I figured those two events would separate the sleeves from the sleeveless on board.

  “What do you make of Anastasia?” I asked Danielle.

  “Very old school.”

  “That’s generous.”

  “I’m having trouble picturing her having an affair.”

  I shuddered. “I was trying to avoid doing that.”

  “I’m serious. What kind of a man would that be?”

  “The same kind that she married, but a little different.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve never had an affair. But I figure there must be things about your partner that are attractive to you and you would look for in anyone, and there are things you’ve grown tired of and want to change.”

  “What do you want to change about me?” she asked. She grinned so I knew she thought she had me.

  “Nothing.”

  “You have to say that.”

  “I do. Because it’s the truth.”

  “No, it’s not. No one’s perfect.”

  “I didn’t say you were perfect. I just said I wouldn’t change anything about you.”

  I finished my beer and slipped out of my chair.

  “Let’s go find this opening ceremony, whatever the hell that is.”

  “Why?”

  “Anastasia will be there. Maybe Guy X will be too.”

  We didn’t consult the map. Instead we just followed all the other salmon. The Dolphin Amphitheater was at the stern of the ship, a semicircular, open-air theater with a stage at the bottom that opened up to a view of the Florida coast we were leaving behind. Just as we got to the top of the seating area I noticed Ron and Cassandra at the bottom. We skipped down the steps toward them and Ron gave me a nod. Cassandra offered her cheek for a kiss. She was big on cheek kisses. She was very European like that. Cassandra was dressed for the opening ceremony, or cocktails, or the opera for that matter. Ron wore a linen suit that I was instantly envious of. It was evening and most of the suits around us were dark or tuxedos. Ron liked to swim against the tide.

  “So?” I whispered to Ron.

  He shook his head.

  “How’s your suite?” Cassandra asked Danielle.

  “Cozy,” she replied.

  The tapping of a microphone brought everyone’s attention to the stage. Cassandra and Ron sat down at the front, and Danielle and I moved to the side as a man in a garish shirt and long white shorts asked everyone to find a seat and then began trying to whip the crowd into a frenzy. He asked the audience if they were ready for a good time and got a handful of mumbled affirmations, to which he responded with an I can’t hear you! The response, if anything, was more muted the second time around. I couldn’t help but feel he had misjudged his audience on this particular voyage. Palm Beach types don’t tend to get worked into a frenzy, except on bad stock market days.

  He didn’t let it get to him, though. He continued in the same excited voice and told us that we were in for a once-in-a-lifetime cruise, a celebration of all things football. Again the response was limited to a few hollers from the sleeveless crowd. Then he announced that following the opening welcome there would be a ticketed reception in the Castaway Casino—a name that didn’t engender a lot of confidence in the success of the voyage—and an open event featuring free music in all three buffet restaurants. Then, without further ado, he asked us to give it up for Captain Sterling.

  I felt the response might have been something more if he had asked us to put our hands together, or even just welcome the captain. This was not a give it up crowd. But like his warm-up man, the captain didn’t let it get to him. He was, however, a good few decibels lower in volume and energy. The audience seemed to appreciate this. Like aircraft pilots, people like their ship captains to be calm and considered individuals. Crazy and zany was generally not a great look for them.

  “Hello, and welcome on board our new flagship vessel, Canaveral Star. My name is Captain Sterling.”

  This got the biggest applause of all—I suspect because it didn’t include any confusing directions. Watching the audience, I also got the feeling that a few of the older patrons might have misheard his name as Stubing, the captain from The Love Boat, and no one had a bad voyage under that guy.

  Captain Sterling was the very embodiment of a ship’s captain. He was tall and thin and looked to be in his fifties, with gray at his temples and a spring in his step. He looked resplendent in his all-white uniform and hat, which he removed before launching into his speech. He welcomed us and hoped we would enjoy ourselves, or words to that effect. I wasn’t paying a lot of attention. Instead, I was looking over the audience, specifically for Anastasia Conners. The captain went on about how many restaurants and bars were on board, and then gave us an outline of our sail, out and around the Bahamas with a day stop on the cruise line’s own private island paradise.

  I found Anastasia sitting a few rows from the front. She had actually changed into a burgundy gown, which made me wonder if our bags had yet made it to our bunks in the engine room. As the captain finished welcoming all the owners, current and past players and dignitaries—which I took to mean the rest of us—I scanned the audience around Anastasia for a sign of Guy X. Then the captain welcomed an honored guest to open the special voyage. One of Palm Beach’s favorite sons, a football hero through and through.

  I knew who it was before I turned around and before the captain said his name.

  “BJ Baker.”

  The captain clapped and the audience followed and BJ Baker stepped up onto the stage from the opposite side to where I stood. I glanced at Danielle, who smiled.

  Baker strode up to the mic with all the vim and vigor of a thirty-year-old man, which wasn’t bad for a guy who had been on the planet for thirty years twice around and then some. His firm frame and square jaw showed him to be the athlete that he was back in the day. He was a fine specimen of a man and an altogether unpleasant human being.

  BJ took the stage and welcomed football fans and non-fans alike. Unlike the warm-up guy, BJ knew his crowd. He spoke about the proud tradition Florida had of hosting more Super Bowls than any other state. He put in a little jab about California wishing it had hosted.

  He kept rambling on and I left him to it. I again turned my attention to the audience. After all, this was my best chance to spot a large chunk of the passengers all in one place. It wasn’t everyone, not by a long shot. Plenty of folks didn�
��t give a dime and two nickels about BJ Baker or his speech. The bars were already doing a roaring trade, and I was willing to bet the spa was as well. But there were enough people to make it worthwhile. Especially with Frederick in his room and Anastasia in the audience. Guy X might be close by. I started again from Anastasia’s position and swept my eye up and down the rows toward the front.

  Then I saw him. Not Guy X. I should be so lucky. On the other side of the seating I saw the half-drunk blond guy from the Hall of Fame. He was still with his buddies, and he still wore his Cleveland Browns uniform. And he still had a major grudge against BJ Baker. I had gotten security onto him before he had been able to do anything to BJ’s Heisman Trophy. Now he had a better target. The man himself. I could see he had traded in his can for a nearly full plastic cup of beer, which splashed as he moved along the side of the seating, toward the stage. It was pretty obvious what his plan was. BJ hadn’t played for Pittsburgh in forty years, and this guy looked like he had been born a good two decades after BJ’s playing days were over. It made me wonder what those Cleveland guys would do if you really did something to upset them. This was a grudge of Olympic proportions.

  And I wanted to let him do it.

  I really had no problem with someone planting a full cup of beer on BJ Baker. I would go as far as to say it would have made my day. I watched the guy move toward the front of the seating and I looked around for any security who might stop him. There were none. I glanced at BJ. He was in full rant, a captive audience in his grasp.

  Behind him, Captain Sterling was looking at the blond guy with the beer. He knew what was happening. But he was trapped between an iceberg and a hard place. He wanted to yell out, to stop the guy, or to jump up and push BJ Baker out of the way, to take one for the team. But he was paralyzed by the idea of causing a commotion, of starting the cruise on the very wrong foot. Paralyzed by the infinitesimal chance that the blond guy wasn’t actually going to do what every fiber in the captain told him the guy was going to do.

  Then the captain looked for help. For the security guards I couldn’t see. He couldn’t spot them either, or at least not close enough to do anything. I knew because his eyes settled on me. I don’t know why. I was dressed like all the other second-class passengers, in vacation attire rather than any kind of suit. There was nothing about me that suggested I even knew what was transpiring. Except that he knew I knew, and his face was like that of a man who had just lost his balance on the edge of a cliff. He was going over, that was for certain, and he needed someone to save him, for he was beyond saving himself.

  I couldn’t let him start the whole cruise off like that. I took off in a half crouch, down below the line of the stage. I was visible to pretty much everyone, but figured it would be better to stay low. Perhaps I was just a guy who needed the bathroom. I dashed across and halfway there I glanced up. BJ was mid-vowel, his mouth shaped like he was saying “oooooo.” It felt like slow motion as he looked down at the movement below him and caught my eye, and as time slowed, his brain raced through his mental Rolodex, and I saw it stop on J for Jones, and then his face changed from charm to death wish and then back again, as he realized he was still in front of his captive audience. I didn’t see what happened after that. The blond guy reached a point where we were the same distance from the stage and he wound back his arm, cocking it, ready to pitch.

  I was low, so I pushed up and hit the guy slightly from behind. His throwing arm was right back and starting forward, so I grabbed it and used his momentum to drive it into his back. His beer exploded against his spine and drenched his Browns shirt and his jeans. I kept going. I drove him away from the stage, away from the crowd.

  Then I saw another guy. This one was dressed in white like the captain. He was serious looking and seemed to be heading toward the blond guy, but on realizing what I was doing broke left and met me at a door off to the side of the stage.

  It was a personnel door, crew only. The guy in uniform tapped a keycard to a box on the wall and pulled the door open. I drove the blond guy right through it. The crew guy followed me into a bland, cream-colored corridor. I pushed the Cleveland guy up against the wall and he made his first noises since I tackled him. There were a lot of choice words. His swear jar was going to be full to overflowing.

  “I’m ship security,” said the man in uniform.

  “I figured,” I said, and I let him take hold of the guy. As I moved back, two more uniformed crew stepped into the corridor.

  The security guy said, “Sir, are we going to have a problem?”

  “No, man,” said Cleveland. “I’m just standing there, minding my own business—”

  “Sir, have you been drinking?”

  “It’s a cruise, pal.”

  One of the other crew members said, “It’s the guy from the disturbance in ball three.”

  “Sir, we’re going to take a little walk, okay?” said the security guy. “I’m going to let you go now.”

  As he was let go the blond guy turned around to look at me. He hadn’t seemed to like me before in the Hall of Fame. He seemed even less enamored with me now. He flexed his arm and felt his wet backside.

  “You’ll be lucky if I don’t sue. And who’s going to pay for my beer?”

  “I’m sure BJ will buy you one,” I said.

  The blond guy launched himself at me. I didn’t step back, but he didn’t reach me. The two crewmen stepped in and put him back against the wall.

  “Let’s go and dry out for a while, sir,” said one of them, and together they frogmarched him away.

  I was left standing with the security guy. I waited for him to give me a hard time for cutting in on his turf. He offered his hand.

  “Mahoney,” he said. “Chief Security Officer.”

  We shook hands. “Miami Jones.”

  “Thanks for your help out there.”

  “No sweat.”

  “I’m sure Mr. Baker will be most grateful.”

  “I highly doubt that.”

  The door to the amphitheater burst open, and on cue, BJ Baker charged in like a wounded bull. Even his nostrils flared. He paid no mind to Mahoney. He only had eyes for me.

  “I’m gonna tear you a new one, Jones, you ingrate.”

  I looked at Mahoney and smiled.

  “See?”

  Chapter Eight

  BJ Baker came at me.

  Mahoney, the security chief, stepped between us. “Mr. Baker, Mr. Jones just averted an incident.”

  “Jones is the incident.”

  “Nice to see you, BJ,” I said. I may have said it with a big grin on my face.

  “No one gets to interrupt me on stage, especially you, Jones.”

  BJ liked being the thunder and he didn’t like anyone stealing it from him. He was, in the most pure sense, a limelight hog. I supposed a lot of media people were. They had to be, in a way. Having your face plastered all over screens across the country made you famous, and more than that, it gave people a false sense of familiarity. If you appeared in people’s living rooms every week, you must be friends, right? As a result, these people had to either hide from their public or embrace it. BJ embraced it. He had been a big personality during college at USC, and he was a bigger personality during his stint in the NFL. In the decades since he had played, his personality had not receded any. And he still loved being the center of attention.

  “Sir, there was a drunk patron,” said Mahoney, “and Mr. Jones prevented him from throwing something at you.”

  “Probably one of Jones’s buddies. You do drink your sad life away at a dive bar, don’t you, Jones?”

  I figured Mick would be okay with the tag of dive bar for his beloved Longboard’s. It would keep the tourists away. But Mahoney turned to me.

  “Do you know that man?” he asked.

  “The Browns guy? No, I don’t know him. Only saw him once before, in your Hall of Fame.”

  “You were the one who called in the disturbance in ballroom three?” said Mahoney.

 
“I was.” I looked at BJ. “Before he went after you, he was going to try to damage your Heisman. That’s twice I’ve had to save that thing. You really ought to keep better care of it.”

  “Why I oughtta—”

  BJ didn’t get to finish, which just wound him up even more, as the door was pulled open again and Captain Sterling stepped into the bland corridor. It was like the kitchen at a party, everyone wanted to be in there even though it was the least comfortable place to be.

  “Mr. Baker, I’m glad you’re okay,” said the captain. He offered his hand to me. “Captain Sterling.”

  Mahoney said, “Captain, this is Mr. Jones.”

  “Miami,” I said.

  “Well, Mr. Jones, we owe you debt of thanks.”

  “A debt of thanks?” BJ Baker bellowed.

  “Yes,” said Sterling. “Mr. Jones stopped a man from throwing his beer at you, Mr. Baker.” He turned to his head of security. “I didn’t realize that people would be so passionate about their teams. We need to be more vigilant, Army.”

  “Yes, sir. I agree,” said Mahoney.

  “Don’t let this guy fool you,” spat BJ. “He’s all kinds of trouble.”

  “I can’t speak to that, sir,” said Sterling. “But I did see the whole thing, and Mr. Jones dealt with the situation without alarming the passengers, and that is my primary concern.” The captain turned to me. “You clearly know what you are doing, Mr. Jones.”

  “I’m on board as backup security for one of your auction vendors. This is kind of what I do.”

  “Ha!” said BJ.

  “Well, sir, I thank you,” said the captain. “I trust you will also have time to enjoy the facilities on board.”

  “That’s the plan.”

  “I’d like to send a thank you basket to your suite. You’re on which deck?”

  “Three,” I said. “It’s a cute little fixer-upper next to the engine room.”

  “Deck three?” The captain shook his head. “No, that won’t do. Army, didn’t the morning briefing say the Palmentieri party had canceled?”