Spring Tide Read online

  Spring

  Tide

  Zodiac ForceS

  Cancer

  Tami Veldura

  LOVELIGHT PRESS

  Military F/F

  Spring Tide © Tami Veldura 2016.

  Amazon Kindle Edition.

  Edited by Micki.

  Cover design by Aria.

  All rights reserved. No part of this story may be used, reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission of the copyright holder, except in the case of brief quotations embodied within critical reviews and articles.

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  The author has asserted his/her rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book.

  This book contains sexually explicit content which is suitable only for mature readers.

  First LoveLight Press electronic publication: March 2016.

  http://lovelightpress.com

  Spring Tide features American characters, and as such uses American English throughout.

  NAVIGATION

  FOREWORD

  ONE / TWO / THREE / FOUR

  FIVE / SIX / SEVEN / EIGHT

  NINE / TEN / ELEVEN / TWELVE THIRTEEN / FOURTEEN / FIFTEEN / SIXTEEN

  SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS!

  MORE FROM LOVELIGHT PRESS

  MORE FROM TAMI VELDURA

  Foreword

  Cancer is the watercraft-branch of the privatized Zodiac Forces. If you can float a boat, you'll find Cancer operatives on the water investigating. Whiplash and Cardinal are two soldiers off the coast of Italy, hot on the trail of an ivory smuggling gang.

  Instead of ivory, they find a message in a bottle calling for help. It's ten years old and the case is probably cold, but Whiplash knows a proper adventure when she sees one and Cardinal is along for the ride. It gets personal when the trail leads back to the very smugglers they were tracking. Both Whip and Cards are kidnapped and the woman who threw that message in a bottle: she locked Cardinal in the forward berth of the ship herself.

  Was it a trap for the Zodiac women or does the lady pirate want out? Separated from her partner and supplies, it's up to Cards to keep it together and get herself free. If it means pretending to cooperate, even pretending to fall in love, Cardinal won't pull any punches.

  1

  The sea moved. A few feet below the surface, Cardinal and Whiplash had no choice but to bend with the tide. They were geared for diving—masks, tanks, and wetsuits. Down here, anchored under the waves, the surface crash was nothing more than a dull roar of bubbles and distant hiss of sand. In the distance, a boat motored by. Its propeller sound bounced off the seafloor. The depth wasn't helping. Currents dragged at them, tugging them further out to sea. Without the anchors, they would be lost.

  It was beautiful, even down here, but Cardinal was well aware of the danger. She checked the seal on her full-face mask and dug her shovel into the mud again. Behind her, Whip turned in the water, her rebreather catching the bubbles of her sigh before they could escape.

  “This is what I mean, Cards. Digging up pottery? Collecting Sicilian gold? I signed up for adventure, not ... not ...” Whiplash made a waving gesture at the muck, slowed by the water.

  Cardinal adjusted her grip on the shovel and pushed a pile down current. The dirt slumped to the sea floor and grayed the water. “Not recovering lost history at the bottom of the Mediterranean?”

  “Well ...”

  “Whiplash, we are quite literally digging up a pirate's buried treasure.”

  “Yeah, well it sounds more glamorous in the movies.” Whiplash sighed again and the echo of it ricocheted in Cardinal's earpiece.

  Cardinal dug her shovel into the mud. She'd take recovering ivory off the sea floor over a face-to-face conflict any day of the week, but she knew that wasn't how Whiplash worked. “Would you rather they had kept it aboard and forced you to shoot it out across the bow of the boat?”

  “Yes!” Whiplash thunked the butt of her shovel into the dirt. It clouded up around her fins. “Yes, I would have.” She put a hand on her hip.

  Cardinal laughed. “I'm so sorry to have deprived you.”

  “Darn right you are.” Whiplash sighed again with emphasis. “Hammerhead approaching at seven o'clock. Counter-clockwise.”

  Cardinal glanced up to her left and spotted the predator gliding leisurely in their direction, checking them out. The counter-shading made it hard to spot against the bright surface of the water, but it eventually decided they were doing nothing of significant interest and moved on. Cardinal shoveled another loose layer of dirt to the side.

  “I guess I'm wondering why these guys would bother with smuggling in the first place—isn't kidnapping and extortion where it's at now? They need to get with the program.”

  Cardinal smiled down at the mud. Whiplash was never satisfied with the jobs that were easier. Jobs that didn't involve the possibility of dramatic injury. Her shovel lodged into something that gave by inches. A digital readout on her mask blinked. She prodded twice to make sure. “Whip, I've got something here.”

  Whiplash swam around to help move sediment. “I was really hoping you wouldn't find anything, this is too easy.”

  “Such a pity to have a completed job in your mission file. Such a hard job to enjoy Italy for two weeks with hazard pay.” Cardinal held the laugh in the back of her mouth.

  “Shut up.” Whiplash grumbled.

  Cardinal took Whip's shovel so she'd have both hands. “Just open it.”

  Whiplash cut the twine holding the bag shut and reached in. She dropped an old boot to the sea floor. “Seriously?” She upended the burlap bag. Boots and empty wine bottles tumbled across the mud. No smuggled ivory. No illegal rhino horn. Not even a branch of endangered wood. “It's just a bag of junk.” Some bottles had peeling labels. The boot leather was cracked.

  Cardinal fished a bottle out of the pile. “There's something stuffed in this one. It's sealed.”

  Whiplash bundled the bag under her arm. “Bring it up. This was a waste of time and now they've got a day's lead on us.”

  Cardinal had to agree. In retrospect, it had been too good of a chance. What kind of pirate taunted Zodiac operatives with their contraband, anyway? “At least I shot the one in the arm.” They pushed off the sea floor and followed the anchor line all the way up to their boat on the rocking surface.

  Whiplash said, “See, gunfights are always easier. Very straightforward. If they're shooting at you, they're the bad guys and you should shoot back. I'm pro gunfights.”

  “I'm pro not getting shot.” Cardinal said, following Whip's kicking fins.

  “No adventure that way.” Whip hit the surface and pulled her mask up. She tossed the mag on board and popped up out of the ocean. She gave Cardinal a hand up.

  The boat rocked in the setting sun. Cardinal stripped off mask, flippers, and tank with a sigh. Her wetsuit squeaked. She handed the wine bottle into Whiplash's wiggling fingers.

  Whiplash lay sprawled on the deck, much like a displaced starfish, still geared and not caring. She pulled the cork in the bottle. It came out with a wet pop. Whiplash pulled out a single small rolled paper from inside. She frowned and flipped it around in her hands.

  Cardinal hauled up the anchor, a crank on the side of the boat. “What is it?”

  “I don't know. It just says, Mom, I'm still alive. It's signed Natalie Bowman and dated ten years ago.”

  “Message in a bottle? How's that for buried treasure?” Cardinal checked their hea
ding and started the small live-aboard. It rumbled, bubbling and churning water through the engine.

  “This name sounds familiar.” Whip stripped her scuba gear. “I'm going to have Cleo run it.”

  “It's a decade old, you won't find who wrote it.”

  “No appreciation for a mystery. You don't want to know who wrote it? Why?”

  Cardinal turned them toward the mainland. “It's just not the right medium for an EDS. Mom, I'm still alive? An email would have been more effective. Or a phone call.”

  Whiplash smiled. “Maybe she was kidnapped! Oh, I love a good kidnapping.” She hurried down the stairs to radio their Aries intelligence contact, Cleo.

  “Ten years ago ... oh, forget it.”

  “You weren't hugged as a child, Cards!”

  Cardinal shook her head and revved the boat toward town. Whiplash went looking for adventures wherever they went. If deployment to Italy during a beautiful July wasn't going to stop her, nothing would. She pushed the throttle up and let the boat come up on plane.

  2

  Cardinal leaned against the side wall of the boat with one eye on her radar. The engines screamed, pushing the boat forward—a constant din of white noise that made thinking difficult. The floor vibrated the floor beneath her feet until her ankles were numb. Wind pulled at her short hair and the salt spiked it up in awkward directions.

  Whiplash came back up dressed in her Cancer-blue fatigues with a box-hat tight over her brow. She waved Cardinal away from the wheel, who gave it up eagerly. Driving into the setting sun was tough.

  The radio crackled as she descended the steps. It sounded like someone on the other end had pushed a button to talk but wasn't speaking. Cardinal paused to listen, but she couldn't hear anything over the noise of the engines.

  Stripping out of a damp wetsuit was its own kind of workout. Cardinal struggled to pull the neoprene over her thighs and calves, but to be dressed again in pants and an additional wind jacket was worth the trouble. Cardinal stood at the desk, turning the blue wine bottle over in her hand. The crab insignia on her breast distorted in the reflection on the glass. There was no label or embossing. It seemed to be just a cheap wine bottle. The note it saved was written in small, neat script and signed with flourish. Obviously someone with formal schooling. No one Cardinal knew signed their name this legibly except Motocross. She supposed private tutors would do that.

  “Natalie Bowman ... who are you?” Cardinal was curious—what kind of person sends a distress call by bottle? But despite dredging it up in that bag the pirates had dropped, she didn't think it was relevant to their mission. Millions in scientifically useless but culturally powerful ivory was more important than a ten-year-old message.

  The radio chirruped. Then static. Cardinal leaned over to turn up the volume.

  “—rates are boarding! We're just tourists here, there's nothing of value on board! SOS! Help! Does anyone speak English out there?”

  Cardinal grabbed the radio. “This is Zodiac Cancer craft oh-three-four. We hear you, SOS. Repeat your location.”

  A scramble of Italian clashed on the radio, then, “Oh, thank God, it's Zodiac. Guys, I've got Zodiac! We're just past the bay point. Come quickly!”

  “Take a breath, we're already on our way. What's the problem?”

  “PIRATES!”

  Cardinal didn't believe in coincidence. She jumped from her seat and sent the wine bottle spinning. She flew up the stairs. “Whip! The bay point. Now!”

  Whiplash hauled the craft to starboard and throttled them up to full speed. The boat jumped on the water. Cardinal navigated back down to the radio squawking in a panic without her. “Listen to me,” she snapped. “Lock yourselves in where you are and barricade the doors if you can. Duck under anything that will give you cover. Stay away from the windows.”

  More voices, both English and Italian. “What do they want from us?”

  Cardinal frowned at the bottle on the table, remembering Whiplash's words. “Hostages.”

  Static on the line. The delicate sound of breaking glass. Cardinal slammed the radio down and hauled open a cabinet. It was a gunfight Whiplash wanted, and a gunfight she'd get. Cardinal holstered her M9 pistol at her thigh and slung a shotgun across her back. She grabbed Whip's MK23, checking the cartridge automatically. The forty-five was hefty for close-quarters, but if it came down to guns, Zodiac operatives always packed to win. Cardinal raced up to the deck. There was nothing across the water. No SOS craft. No pirates.

  “Here.” Cardinal handed off the guns. “Pirate attack on a tourist boat at the point. Might be our guys.”

  “See, hostages. Much more profitable.” Whip's frown gave her light words an ominous tone.

  “Maybe we get lucky.”

  But the boat could only go so fast and the pirates had hours on them. By the time Whip and Cardinal reached the point and the overrun boat, it had been scuttled. There was no sign of the pirates and debris littered the bay mouth.

  Whiplash powered down to a slow idle, and motored between floating cargo and pieces of boat hull. “No local enforcement,” she said sadly.

  Cardinal shook her head. “Probably paid off.” They'd already argued with the dock police more than once. Cardinal could appreciate resisting a foreign ops group dispensing law where they saw fit, but this was a local boat. Wasn't it? Fiberglass slapped and sucked against the hull. She shaded her eyes against the sliver of sun and peered across the bright surface of the water. The effect was a strange, high-contrast view of the wreckage. Nothing moved.

  They bumped a larger chunk of hull. It rocked around and revealed a man, exhausted, clinging to the piece of flotsam. “Whip! Man overboard!” Cards stowed her weapons, stripped off her wind jacket, and dove into the water, portside. It was oily.

  She grabbed the man around his chest and he flailed in sudden panic. She tightened her grip. “Hey, I'm here to help, relax, calm down.”

  “Who ... who are you?” He stopped fighting but shivered uncontrollably.

  “Zodiac. Cancer. I'm getting you out of here.” He was dressed only in shorts and a t-shirt, and he had to be nearing hypothermia. Whiplash helped haul him aboard and immediately stripped his soaked clothing.

  “Hey—!” He didn't have the coordination to protest. The cold water had sapped fine motor function from his muscles.

  Cardinal wrapped him in a thermal emergency blanket and guided him down the steep stairs of their live-aboard. “Let's get you warm,” she said.

  With no other sign of survivors, Whiplash guided the boat out of the wreckage. Below, Cardinal tuned the radio and explained the situation in fluent Italian to the authorities.

  3

  “What's your name?” Cardinal poured a hot mug of tea for the tourist in her berth and sat on a corner of the bed. He accepted the cup gratefully, still wrapped in the emergency blanket.

  “Frank,” he said, shaking. “Frank Dwight.”

  Slightly balding and late middle-aged, an adventure seeker Frank was not. He had a bit of weight around his middle and showed no sign of familiarity with boats. He overcompensated every time their craft rocked on the water.

  “Whiplash is taking us back into Punta Ala Marina. Do you have anyone you can stay with?”

  He nodded. “My wife, she went shopping today. Thank God.” He rubbed a hand down his face. “Oh my god, I would have died out there. Thank you.”

  Maybe. Cardinal didn't find it useful to speculate. “I've told the authorities at the port what I know but they'll have questions for you, too. They'll make sure you can contact your wife.”

  “Why are you guys even out here? I mean, I'm grateful, but isn't this a little far for the Cancer force?”

  “We operate anywhere you can float a boat, Mr. Dwight. And there are worse places to be assigned than the Mediterranean.” Cardinal smiled and encouraged him to drink the tea. “Can you walk me through what happened?” They needed information, but Whiplash wasn't quite a people person. Between the two of them, Cardinal had all the
soft skills while Whip preferred to punch first and questions rarely came up.

  Mr. Dwight pulled his blanket closer. “I don't know why they did it. It was just a tourist boat. This other boat came up really close on one side and a woman on board yelled at our captain. They were talking in Italian; I don't know what they argued about.”

  “Do you remember anything about the boat?”

  “It was white, like ours.” He smiled and said sheepishly, “Sorry, not really a sailor.”

  Cardinal gave him another gentle smile. “That's ok. What happened after the argument?”

  Mr. Dwight took a drink of the tea. “Our captain turned the boat away. I think he was trying to go back to the port? The pirates tied our boats together and boarded. That was when some of us ran up the stairs and locked the door. I got on the radio to call for help—then I heard you guys.”

  Cardinal nodded. She indicated her speaker beside them. “I heard glass over the radio—did they break into the wheelhouse?”

  “Wheelhouse?”

  “The cockpit you were in with the radio.”

  Mr. Dwight shook his head. “I don't know. They broke the lock on the door and two guys started carrying people away. There were ... I don't know, seven of us in there? Oh, yes—one of them did break the glass with his gun. They were dragging people out the window when we barricaded the door.” He stared at his tea for several breaths. “They took everyone out, then it was only me and they came back. I was fighting them when the floor started tipping. They ran after that. I climbed out the window when they left, the boat was leaving, though and ours was breaking. I hung onto a piece and that's how you found me.”

  “Was there anything different about the pirate boat from yours? Words or a picture maybe?”

  “Hmm.” He swallowed his tea. “They did have something written on the back. Mile Flor? Flory?”

  “Millefiori?”

  “Sure. Maybe?” Cardinal found a notepad and wrote it out for him, but he shrugged. “What does it mean?”