Wave Riders, Page 2

  For the thousandth time that morning, the twins’ gazes roamed restlessly across the ocean, as though at any moment Gabe might bob up to the surface in a diving suit, lift his mask and say, ‘Sorry I’ve been gone so long, kids, but you won’t believe what I’ve found! A sunken galleon full of treasure!’

  Or come roaring up in a speedboat, yelling, ‘Ta da! Birthday surprise!’

  Ordinarily, Jess’s super-sensible, wise-beyond-her-years approach to life made her easy to tease and was the cause of many of the twins’ rows. Now Jude was grateful for it. Jess was right. She was always right. Not as often as she thought she was, but quite a lot. Added to which, she’d read so many mystery novels that she practically had a degree in Detection. And that’s what the situation called for: a detective.

  She was in Private Investigator mode now as she said, ‘Jude, tell me again what you remember about last night.’

  But Saturday night didn’t make sense unless Jude first thought about Saturday afternoon. So that’s where he started, with the trip to Josiah’s Bay.

  Neither of the twins had eaten since discovering Gabe was missing three hours earlier. They’d been too busy manoeuvring the yacht to a mooring buoy near the Dog Islands. Consequently, Jude’s stomach rumbled as he recalled the smoky aroma of flame-grilled seafood that had wafted in his direction as he’d waited with Sam near Tortola’s finest beach barbecue the previous day.

  On land, Jude always felt like a fish snatched from the sea. His skin became taut and itchy as if it had suddenly shrunk, and his limbs, well adapted to balancing on a bouncy, wind-blasted deck, felt weighed down by gravity.

  Almost everyone who passed him had paused to admire the Swiss Shepherd. Jude wouldn’t have minded if they’d only wanted to chat about dogs, but sooner or later they all wanted to know which yacht he was on and who was skippering it. Inevitably, they leaped to the conclusion that he was on a sailing holiday with his family. That Gabriel Carter was his dad.

  Jude always dreaded that part. Gabe was like a father, but he wasn’t his dad. Could never be his dad. His dad was dead, and nobody would ever replace him.

  Over the years, Jude had perfected the art of avoiding prying questions, but that afternoon one couple had been particularly nosy. They’d taken a shine to Sam and kept pawing him. As they fussed over the dog, they’d grilled Jude on where he’d sailed from, whether or not he had any siblings, and how long his father planned on staying in the Caribbean.

  ‘What an adventurous life you must lead! Where’s Dad taking you next?’

  Desperate to stem the torrent of questions, Jude bluntly informed them that his parents were dead. That was a mistake, because their faces crumpled with pity.

  ‘You poor, poor boy,’ said the woman with a sigh. ‘If you don’t mind me asking, what happened to them?’

  Mercifully, Jess and Gabe came into view at that moment. Jude bolted through the palms to greet them, dragging Sam behind him.

  Looking back, he should have guessed that something was off as soon as he saw his sister and guardian. Jess, who’d talked of nothing but the books she planned on buying with her birthday money FOR DAYS, hadn’t bought any, and Gabe was acting weird.

  Breaking the news that he wouldn’t, as promised, be treating the twins to the ‘beach barbecue to die for’ because he had a ‘much better plan,’ Gabe had exuded fake cheer.

  Jude, who was starving, let out a heartfelt groan. But before he could beg Gabe to change his mind, Jess caught his eye and shook her head.

  He wished now that he’d asked more questions. Regrettably, he’d thought only of his stomach. And Gabe had soon won him over with an industrial quantity of coconut shrimp, roti and Key Lime pie, bought from a wildly expensive cafe. He’d also hired an ATV (all-terrain vehicle). The three of them had roared through the lush green hills to Josiah’s Bay, Jude sitting in the back with the dog.

  The pricey picnic and ATV were out of character too. Gabe loathed what he called ‘rip-off’ tourist joints. But Jude hadn’t dwelt on that either. He’d been too busy savouring the picnic and enjoying the kind of afternoon that always made him pinch himself.

  Somewhere, far away, kids were sweating through exams, plonked in front of televisions, staring at their phones, or otherwise sealed off from nature, in dank and stifling rooms in smoggy cities. Meanwhile, he and Jess got to play Frisbee with their dog in the sunshine on a beach that looked newly laundered.

  Later, Jess swam laps of the choppy bay while Jude messed about in rock pools and beachcombed for shells and starfish with Sam. A near-drowning incident at the age of seven had left him wary of swimming in rough water. Although he’d never have admitted it, least of all to his sister, that fear had intensified since they’d left Florida.

  ‘Jess, stay in the shallows where I can see you,’ ordered Gabe. ‘The rip currents here are notorious. If one grabs you, you know to just go with it, right? Don’t fight it. Swim parallel to the shore and the rip’ll sweep you back in.’

  Jess had heard the rip current speech a hundred times over the years, but she dutifully promised to be careful. Gabe knew that she was more dolphin than girl. Under normal circumstances, her guardian would have swum with her. He loved swimming almost as much as she did. Instead, he stayed in the shade, tapping moodily at his phone.

  ‘What’s eating the skipper?’ Jude asked, when Jess returned to the beach. ‘He’s about as relaxed as a surfer in a cove full of tiger sharks.’

  ‘Who knows.’ She towelled off her hair. ‘Maybe he’s still ticked off with the boatyard guy for trying to cheat him over the price of a winch. They nearly got into a fight.’

  Jude stared at her. ‘A fight? Over a winch? But we don’t need a new winch. The ones we have work just fine. Are you sure that’s what he said?’

  ‘Hey, kids!’ called Gabe. ‘I’ve had a flash of genius!’

  He came trotting over. ‘Jess, you asked if we could stay here longer so the bookshop could order your mystery, but we can do better than that. If we sail to Virgin Gorda later today – maybe anchor overnight in the Baths National Park – you can buy your books at Leverick Bay on Sunday. On your actual birthday! How does that sound? Jude, you’ll love it there too. From what I’ve heard, some of the superyachts in the North Sound have to be seen to be believed.’

  He grinned. ‘Before we leave Tortola, let’s swing by the bakery. A birthday isn’t a birthday without cake!’

  ‘If anything’s happened to Gabe, it’s my fault,’ Jess said emotionally. ‘We left Tortola a day earlier than we were meant to because of my stupid book. If I hadn’t made such a big deal about Castle of Secrets, Gabe wouldn’t have decided to sail us to Virgin Gorda to buy it on my birthday.’

  ‘You don’t know that,’ countered her brother. ‘If Gabe wanted to avoid the man at the boatyard, he might have used your birthday present as an excuse to leave the island sooner than he promised. And don’t call books stupid. They’re not stupid – not to you, anyway. When I say stuff like that, you get mad at me.’

  Jude closed his eyes and dug his fingers into his temples. ‘This headache’s stupid. It’s killing me.’

  ‘Maybe the takeaway shrimp gave you food poisoning,’ fretted Jess. ‘If Gabe felt sick or dizzy in the middle of the night, he might have fallen overboard.’

  ‘Food poisoning? From the shrimp? No way! They were delicious. We felt fine afterwards. Anyway, rotten shrimp wouldn’t have made us sleepy. We’d have been barfing our guts up over the side.’

  ‘Eww, gross.’ Jess screwed up her nose. ‘Wait – the coconut lady! We forgot about her. What if she put a sleeping potion in our drinks?’

  The vendor had gone from Jude’s mind too, but now he pictured her clearly. She’d been selling local treats, souvenirs and jewellery near the marina gate when they’d returned at twilight, but it was the green coconuts she seemed most intent on selling.

  ‘Nectar of the gods, sweet as anything,’ she’d told Gabe, her face veiled by the long purple shadows. She’d cut th
e top off one and stuck a straw in it. ‘Buy two, get one free.’

  ‘I spilt mine and didn’t taste a drop, but Sam lapped it up,’ recalled Jess. ‘If her “nectar of the gods” was drugged, that would explain why the dog was in a virtual coma too.’

  Jude and Gabe had planned to enjoy drinking the coconut water once they were underway, but the Christmas Winds that swirled around the Virgin Islands just as the hurricane season drew to a close had blown in with little warning. Gabe had judged it safer to anchor near Devil’s Bay than to continue on to the North Sound.

  It wasn’t until night closed in and they were getting ready for bed that Gabe had remembered the coconuts in the fridge.

  ‘You’ve worked hard, kid. Stay hydrated,’ he’d told Jude, handing him one with a smile. ‘Go ahead and catch some zeds. I’m going to stay up and watch the stars.’

  A knife of fear twisted in Jude’s gut. ‘Last thing I remember is asking Gabe if I could watch the stars with him. Everything else is a blank.’

  Jess, who’d gone to bed early with a book, said, ‘What are the chances of a rogue wave striking here, in these islands?’

  Jude shrugged. ‘Not impossible, but a big swell, a north swell, is more likely.’

  The twins glanced at the ocean again, each thinking the same thing. If his drink was spiked, Gabe might have been unsteady on his feet when an extreme surge bucked the yacht.

  ‘But why would a total stranger put a sleeping draught in our drinks?’ demanded Jude. ‘It doesn’t make sense.’

  ‘Maybe the coconut lady was in league with a gang of thieves? Say they saw the marina logbook and thought we were spending the night in Nanny Cay, they might have plotted to creep onboard and rob us while we were unconscious.’

  Jude wasn’t convinced. ‘I love You Gotta Friend, but she was the oldest, least valuable boat in the marina. Some of those superyachts are worth tens of millions of dollars. They have passengers with hundred-thousand-dollar watches and diamond rings on every finger. Anyone can see that we don’t have a thing worth stealing.’

  ‘We need to find Gabe’s phone,’ said Jess. ‘That way we’ll know who he was messaging from the beach. If the man at the boatyard wanted revenge for some past wrong, he might have paid pirates to kidnap Gabe.’

  ‘Then why didn’t the pirates take us?’ scoffed Jude. ‘You gotta stop reading so many mysteries, sis. This is real life, not a fantasy.’

  ‘If you read the news once in a while, you’d know that real-life pirates are forever hijacking boats in the Caribbean Sea and Indian Ocean,’ Jess retorted huffily. ‘Maybe these particular pirates just didn’t want to deal with an extremely annoying boy.’

  Her brother rubbed his sore head. ‘All these maybes are freaking me out. If the skipper’s not back by tomorrow morning, I say we break into his secret compartment and search for clues. Agreed?’

  Jess’s eyes widened. Gabe had forbidden them to open the metal box hidden beneath a floorboard in his cabin unless it was a life-or-death emergency. ‘Don’t you dare touch it unless I’m forty fathoms under the sea and swimming with the fishes,’ he’d warned them. ‘If I’m still breathing, it doesn’t count.’

  He hadn’t mentioned what to do if he vanished in unexplained circumstances.

  ‘Agreed?’ pressed Jude.

  ‘Agreed,’ Jess said reluctantly. ‘Oh Jude, I’m scared. I miss Gabe so much. He wasn’t perfect, but he was a good man.’

  Jude huddled nearer to his sister and dog. Whatever had become of the skipper, he had a bad feeling that there was no way back.

  ‘Jess, even good people have secrets.’

  3

  THE PROMISE

  That night, the twins fell asleep on deck in their clothes, listening out for engines, for the cry of a struggling swimmer, for a radio message, for anything.

  They were exhausted from searching for Gabe. Fearful of moving the boat in case Gabe returned, they’d spent hours scrambling over the uninhabited Dog Islands, Jess half-hoping that their guardian had gone exploring in the darkness in a moment of madness and was lying unconscious behind a boulder or in a rock pool.

  In the afternoon, Jude had rowed out as far as he could in the dinghy while Jess put on a snorkel and scoured the nearby shallows. But, when the sun went down without them finding so much as a thread from the orange T-shirt Gabe had been wearing when they last saw him, they’d had to admit defeat.

  As they slept, the yacht swayed with the current, lines squeaking. The sea wind moaned like a discontented monster.

  In the early hours, Jude was woken by light so dazzling he thought someone was shining a torch in his eyes. When he opened them to find himself bathed in moonlight, he felt a rush of happiness. He was at sea. Free.

  It wasn’t until he saw Jess in the cockpit, face puffy with crying, clutching Sam as if he were a a teddy bear, that he remembered. Sorrow flooded through him.

  Gabe was gone, claimed by the sea – or worse.

  ‘He’s not coming back, is he?’ said Jess.

  Love and rage flamed in Jude’s chest. He vowed then he’d do everything in his power to protect her. But he couldn’t start by lying to her.

  ‘No, sis. I don’t think he is.’

  She said fiercely, ‘Then let’s not wait till sunrise. Let’s open the secret compartment now.’

  Down in Gabe’s cabin, Jude used a screwdriver to prise open the board beneath the bunk. He hesitated before lifting out the metal box. ‘Sure you want to do this? What if we don’t like what we find?’

  Jess handed him the key. ‘Gabe’s taken care of us since we were babies. Whatever’s happened, we need answers.’

  Jude’s stomach was a cauldron of nerves and nausea. In the past twenty hours, he and Jess had eaten almost nothing. Their birthday had come and gone without being celebrated.

  Gabe’s words had proved eerily prophetic. ‘Jude, you’re about to be twelve. It’s time you took some responsibility for your actions and quit goofing around.’

  Jude twisted the key.

  If the twins had expected something dramatic – a gun, a disguise, a false identity – they were disappointed. Stuffed in the metal box was a waterproof pouch holding Gabe’s passport and driver’s licence, his yacht registration papers, a credit card and $200 in cash. There was also a brown envelope containing an annual statement from an American bank.

  Everything seemed in order apart from the bank statement. Gabe had always insisted on paying for everything they needed, even expensive sail repairs, using cash he took out of ATM machines.

  ‘Safer that way,’ he’d told them. ‘Cash is king if you don’t want the whole world stealing your money or knowing your business.’

  The ATM withdrawals listed on the bank statement charted their travels: $250 in Miami, $310 in Key West, $160 in Exuma, $500 in the Cayman Islands, and so on. There was nothing unusual or unexpected.

  What did get their attention was the $10,000 deposited in Gabe’s account a week before they left Florida and the $1,000 deposited in it on the first day of every month since.

  Jude frowned. ‘It’s almost as if the skipper’s being paid a wage. I didn’t know he was working for anyone.’

  ‘Neither did I. They’re international payments too.’ Jess squinted at the reference. ‘HOPEFLI. Do you think that’s a person or a company?’

  Jude gave a hoot of laughter. ‘Could be secret agent code. Half the time he went out on those night fishing trips back in Bantry Creek, he’d come home with no fish or day-old fish. It always made me suspicious. Wouldn’t it be funny if it turns out that he’s an actual spy? For years, we’ve been his cover as he’s carried out lethal missions for the FBI or CIA, only this time something’s gone horribly wrong.’

  ‘No, it would not be funny,’ Jess said crossly. ‘Jude, be serious for once. Looking back, don’t you think it’s weird how we left Florida at night and in a hurry, as if we were bank robbers hightailing it out of town?’

  ‘Nah, we set sail at night because of the tides
. And because the skipper hates goodbyes.’

  ‘Forget tides and goodbyes, Jude. Nothing about the way we set sail five months ago was normal. What kind of guardian says, “Pack your bags, kids! We’re off to sea for a year, or maybe forever!” I mean, one minute we were sitting happily in school. Next, we were being plucked out halfway through a lesson—’

  ‘I wasn’t sitting happily in school,’ said Jude with a scowl. ‘School was the worst. The kids, the teachers, the lessons, the detentions. Every second was pure torture. The day we set sail was the best of my life.’

  Jess glared at him. ‘It was the worst day of my life, but never mind about that. Jude, don’t you see, it doesn’t matter if you felt good about going and I didn’t, or who was right and who was wrong. It doesn’t even matter how we felt yesterday. Everything’s changed now that Gabe’s disappeared. We have to face facts. Either he’s had an accident or there’s been foul play.’

  ‘This is nuts,’ railed Jude. ‘Bet you there’s an innocent explanation. Any minute now, Gabe’ll come stomping in and give us hell about going through his private stuff.’

  Sam chose that exact moment to come lolloping down the steps and burst into the cabin. The twins nearly had heart attacks.

  Jess recovered first and gave the dog a cuddle. ‘Poor Sam. We forgot to give him dinner last night. Forgot to feed ourselves too. Let’s take a breather and scramble some eggs. If we don’t eat, we’ll be no use to Gabe or one other.’

  Despite this sage advice, Jess managed only a few mouthfuls of food before pushing her plate away. The eggs and bread – picked up in Tortola when they’d stopped to buy cake – reminded her that the cupboards in the galley were almost bare. Replenishing their supplies was another thing Gabe had planned to do on the island before inexplicably changing his mind.

  What had changed it? The scuffle at the boatyard? Or something more sinister?

  Jess looked again at Gabe’s bank balance: $15,822.

  To her, it seemed a fortune. Who was paying him and why?