Dark Fraud: A Ryan Weller Thriller Book 10 (EBOOK)

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CHAPTER 1
Aboard Mount Olympia
Yucatán Straits, Mexico

Captain Carlos Gutierrez’s fingers trembled as he spun the dial of the combination lock. Sweat beaded on his forehead as he forced himself to concentrate, though it was extremely difficult with a gun barrel pressed between his shoulder blades. He knelt before the safe in his stateroom aboard the handysize dry bulk carrier Mount Olympia as it lay motionless in the Yucatán Straits. He missed the second number in the combination, forcing him to start over again.
“Hurry up!” someone ordered in Spanish, and the gun barrel jammed deeper into his skin.
Gutierrez spun the dial more carefully as he silently recited the numbers, then he jerked the safe’s handle down. Relief flooded through him as the door swung open.
Two pirates forced him to his feet and cuffed his hands behind his back with flex cuffs while another swept the cash and valuables from the safe into a bag. A foot to the back of Gutierrez’s knee caused him to collapse to the deck, and he hit his head on the side of his bunk on the way down.
His world swirled with darkness as his vision blurred. Hot blood flowed from his temple and down his cheek. Gutierrez was vaguely aware of receding footsteps as the pirates left his stateroom.
The captain closed his eyes. Images of his wife and children at their home outside Houston swirled through his mind, and Gutierrez wondered if he would ever see them again. It saddened him to think of his children growing up without a father. He didn’t want to die.
Gutierrez knew he was at fault for allowing the pirates to board, thinking they were the security force sent by the ship’s owner, Houston Maritime Investments, or HMI as they were more commonly known. When the investigation into this incident was over, the International Maritime Organization would surely pull his Master Mariner ticket, and maybe even block him from going to sea altogether.
With an uptick in piracy in the Bay of Campeche, HMI had contracted FES Security from Holbox, Mexico, to provide trained crews to combat the threat. Before the Mount Olympia had arrived off Holbox, Gutierrez had prepared the ship to transit the bay by putting rolls of razor wire along her handrails and positioned high-pressure water nozzles to repel boarders. Then there were the scarecrows posted along the length of the ship to give the impression of ample lookouts.
Gutierrez had wholly anticipated sitting in his stateroom with the security team leader, drinking beer and smoking cigars, as they steamed across the Gulf of Mexico. Nothing ever happened on these routine passages, and he’d been unable to figure out why HMI was wasting their money on security when they barely spent a dime on repairing their decrepit vessels.
It seemed to be their modus operandi as of late. The Mount Olympia needed an engine overhaul and serious hull maintenance, and Gutierrez had been limping her along for the better part of six months. The massive diesel engine was running on three of its four cylinders because the piston in the Number Two cylinder had cracked, and they had been steaming at reduced speed to compensate since leaving Peru. Responsible for transporting a load of copper ore, they had one last stop to make in Tampico, Mexico, before docking in their home port of Houston to unload.
In truth, all the ships in the HMI fleet needed work. Gutierrez had captained every one of them, and had fought with HMI’s president, Steven Mikolas, about the lack of skilled deckhands and routine repairs. The Cubans, Haitians, and Hondurans that formed his crew were lazy, and no matter how many times he’d kicked his first mate in the seat of the pants, he’d been unable to get more than the bare minimum out of any of the men.
As Gutierrez lay on the deck, blood streaming down his face and his shoulders screaming from being wrenched behind him and his hands bound together, he felt the hull plates of the Mount Olympia vibrate as a deep boom resonated from somewhere in the bowels of the ship.
What the hell was that?
Outside Gutierrez’s cabin, the red emergency lights winked on as the ship’s power went out and the fire alarm began to wail. The captain’s heart sank as he realized his ship was in deep trouble.
Within moments, the air was thick with acrid smoke. Gutierrez coughed as he struggled against his bonds, trying to break them against the bunk. Fear clutched his gut, and panic caused his feet to flail as he desperately tried to free himself.
Gutierrez didn’t want to die bound in his cabin, consumed by fire. He had to get home to see the smiling faces of his children again.
“We have to go, Captain!” a voice shouted over the din. The first mate, a barrel-chested Puerto Rican named Antonio Rodrigo, appeared out of the smoke and dragged Gutierrez to his feet. “If that fire reaches the fuel tanks, she’ll explode.”
“What about the crew?” Gutierrez asked.
“They are assembling by the lifeboat.”
“Get these off me,” Gutierrez instructed, twisting so Rodrigo could see his hands.
The first mate produced a folding knife and sawed through the bonds. With his hands free, Gutierrez grabbed a shirt from his dresser and covered his mouth and nose, knotting it at the back of his head to keep out the smoke, but thick black air still grated on his lungs every time he inhaled.
“Get to the lifeboat,” Gutierrez told Rodrigo, then turned and sprinted up to the bridge. He found the third mate on the deck. After checking the man’s neck for a pulse, Gutierrez determined he was unconscious and bypassed him to test the power to the radio. Relief flooded through him when he saw it was still operational.
“Mayday! Mayday! Mayday!” Gutierrez cried into the mic. “This is the freighter Mount Olympia.” He gave the latitude and longitude, then added, “We are a bulk ore carrier, and we are on fire. I am preparing to abandon ship.”
The radio crackled as he released the transmit button. The flat voice of the man on the other end replied with, “Mount Olympia, this is U.S. Coast Guard Cutter James. We are en route to your position. Activate your life raft EPIRB as soon as you’re aboard.”
The calm stoicism of the Coast Guardsman’s response helped to steel Captain Gutierrez’s nerves for what lay ahead.
“Copy,” Gutierrez stated.
“Any vessel in the vicinity of Mount Olympia, you are required to render assistance,” the radio operator on the James said over the open emergency radio channel.
Gutierrez hoisted the unconscious third mate to his shoulder and made his way down the metal stairs welded to the outside of the superstructure. He looked forward over the length of the five-hundred-foot-long vessel. Darkness and smoke swallowed the bow of his ship, except for the faint glow of the emergency navigation lights and the white lights atop the four crane masts. Another rumbling explosion sounded from inside the vessel, and flames shot out of a hatch just behind the Number Four hold.
It was gut-wrenching to watch his ship tearing itself apart, but he couldn’t stay aboard. Wanting to see his kids was forefront in Gutierrez’s mind as he turned and headed for the lifeboat.
So much for the captain going down with the ship, he thought.
When Gutierrez reached the stern, two other crewmen took the third mate from the captain’s shoulder and placed him in the enclosed plastic lifeboat. Once the casualty was secured in his seat, the rest of the crew climbed inside.
Gutierrez took a head count. Andrade, the Chief Engineer and Gutierrez’s best friend aboard the Mount Olympia, was missing.
“Where’s Andrade?” Gutierrez asked.
Several crewmen shrugged.
“It doesn’t matter. We have to go now!” another sailor shouted.
They could hear the ship creaking and popping as the heat from the fire expanded the metal hull plates and superheated the decks.
Gutierrez reached for the door of the lifeboat. He couldn’t live with himself if he didn’t look for the chief engineer.
“Stop!” Rodrigo grabbed his arm. “We have to go! Andrade was in the engine room when the first explosion happened.”
Reluctantly, Gutierrez closed the door to the lifeboat. He double-checked that everyone had their five-point safety harness fastened and, before he pulled the mechanical launch lever, he silently prayed the lifeboat would deploy.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then the lock released with a sudden jolt, allowing the lifeboat to freefall thirty feet from its cradle and plunge deep into the water, bow first. It took several long moments for the lifeboat to right itself before it popped back to the surface.
Once the boat stopped rocking, Gutierrez opened the hatch and watched the fire blaze aboard the Mount Olympia.
Then he saw something that took his breath away.
Andrade appeared on the aft deck, waving his arms. Leaving him behind was like a punch to Gutierrez’s stomach. Bile burned at the back of his throat as fire backlit the chief engineer’s silhouette.
He had left his friend to die.
Chastising himself would do no good, but Gutierrez wondered if he could live with the knowledge that he hadn’t done everything in his power to save his friend.
Without warning, a helicopter swept into view. Gutierrez had been so focused on the burning vessel and his stranded friend that he’d failed to acknowledge the sound of its rotors as it approached. Its spotlight trailed along the length of the Mount Olympia before centering on the engineer. From somewhere in the night, a horn blared, and a SAFE Boats International Defender rushed past the lifeboat, leaving it rocking in its wake. The Defender slowed not far from the burning ship and a man spoke into a loudspeaker, encouraging Andrade to jump.
The macabre scene reminded Gutierrez of something out of Dante’s Inferno. In the flickering firelight, Andrade mounted the railing and leaped off, crossing his arms and legs as he fell. The Defender raced over to pluck the engineer from the sea, then it motored to the lifeboat. A gruff-looking man with a thick beard helped Andrade cross to the lifeboat. Gutierrez hugged his friend, thankful to have him safely aboard, even if he was suffering from multiple first-degree burns.
Moments later, the Coast Guard Cutter hove into view. It discharged a motorboat and took the crew of the Mount Olympia to the cutter.
Once aboard, Gutierrez stood at the cutter’s rail with a blanket wrapped around his shoulders, sipping a cup of coffee and watching his ship burn.
He had lost her first to pirates, then to fire. His heart sank as an ocean-going tug arrived on the scene.
Now he had lost her to salvors.
And they were worse than the damn pirates.