Chapter 56

Chuck

When we landed in Tampa, I was ready to bite nails and punch bricks. Too many people with titles were making asses of themselves. I really didn't care how many toes I was going to step on, but I knew one thing for certain; if someone freed these guys, the world would find out about it. I would make sure every major news organization knew every name and every detail.

Nightfox was at the airpark when we landed. I said goodbye to Steve and his family, then to all of my ladies. Maria, Sing, and Taiying were almost too clutching when I told them I would see them later.

As we drove from the airpark, Sam told me, "The hotshots from DC don't know where the prisoners are yet, but they will find them pretty soon. We need to move them quickly. Do you have an idea where to take them?"

I shook my head, "Not really, I figured we were good for a couple of weeks where they are, but with this kind of intensity, they will be found soon."

I asked Sam, "What do you think about taking them out in the Gulf. They can't be found out there, and if someone tells them where they are, they'll have a hell of a time getting them."

Nightfox looked at me funny, "That's pretty sneaky. If we were back home, I would say hide them out in a cave, but out in the Gulf might be just as good."

"Let's go get them. We'll stop by the garage and pick up an SUV big enough to haul them and us out to the yacht club. Let me call Tiny to see if we can use one of the motor launches."

I dialed S&S and asked for Tiny. "Hey, Tiny, Chuck. I need to hide out in the Gulf for a few days. Can I use a motor launch or should I take a sailboat?"

There was a pause, then Tiny said, "Take the motor yacht we bought over in Orlando. You can pilot it so you don't need a crew. Um, ah, check the fuel and the water before you leave and make sure the desalination equipment is working. There should be about two weeks of food in canned goods on board, but if you want anything fresh, get it before you board. I'll call out to the club to get the boat ready. Do you have time for me to send someone out for fresh produce and meat?"

I said, "It's probably going to take me about two to three hours to get there, Tiny, so if that's enough time, fill it up with food for let's say, ten people, for at least a week."

"That's enough time, Chuck. I'll get right on it. Enjoy, there is fishing equipment on board and if you need some numbers for some decent grouper, call me on the sat phone. I'll direct you. Oh Yeah, Chuck, the boat has some camouflage netting stowed in one of the big rear lockers. I bet it was for the drug runners that used it before. The netting might come in handy for you."

I asked Sam, "Ready for some time on a boat?"

He didn't look too happy, but said, "Sure, but it would be a lot nicer if Maria and her kids could come along." Sam looked at with a crooked grin, "You know I'm scared shitless of being out on the water. I'll do this because I trust you, but I'd really rather not be out in a boat."

"Not this time, Champ. If you need to stay ashore, stay. I'll get someone else to go with me."

"Not a chance, Chuck. I wanted to work and hang with you and if this is what you do, I'm with you all the way. Besides, I might be able to feed some sharks."

We went straight to the garage where I talked Hank out of a grubby Suburban. I liked the fact that it was so beat up and dirty. That should hide us out that much longer.

Next stop was Tampa General out on Davis Island. It took me about thirty minutes of badge flashing and bullying to get the prisoners out of there. We linked them together, right down to the idiot in the wheelchair, and led them out a rear door to the SUV.

They kept up a constant barrage of questions as we left the building. I had asked the two men on duty if they had families they had to go home to, and neither did. I asked if they wanted to go on a cruise and do some fishing, and they gladly accepted the offer.

After a quick stop at a Wal-Mart for a pile of clothes for everyone, because of lunchtime traffic, we were out to the yacht club in about an hour and a half. A club attendant had just finished loading up the food lockers with fresh veggies and meats. He smiled at me and said, "Tiny said to fix you up with the best, so I did. I also filled up the beer supply. There's plenty of booze so you shouldn't need anything there. I filled the ice machine with ours so yours can catch up while you're out. Have a good time.

I let the guy get out of sight before I hauled the prisoners out to the boat. We were able to wheel the big guy straight onto the deck and inside the first gangway, so he was out of sight. I told the two deputies, "Keep them together for right now and watch them. Same orders, if they try to escape, shoot them. They are terrorists of sorts and enemies of the U.S."

After pulling the shore utilities, I had Nightfox loosen the front and rear lines while I started the engines. This was one hell of a boat to be hauling a bunch of criminals on. When we were warmed up and ready, he pulled the lines free and I began idling out of the slip.

An hour later, we were at about eighty percent power running south-southwest out into the gulf at a little over twenty knots. After checking the radar, I set up the autopilot then went to check on berthing the prisoners. I told the two deputies, "Put these guys two to a cabin, and be sure you can lock them down at night or during the day when you need a break. Make sure they are locked down tight so we can have some fun and enjoy the trip. Put the cripple with one of the weak links so they can hear him complain all the time. Let's bed them down and see what's for lunch or supper."

We had to let each man use the head, but that was easy with chains as they could reach their zippers and hold their own dick. When we got them in the cabins, we found some great bolted down steel rails. We put a set of cuffs between their waist chain and the rail and they were locked down until we let them up.

When I went into the cabin with the big guy, he began cussing me and swearing. I pulled my Glock and put it to his head and said, "I don't like you. If you continue to aggravate me, I'm going to toss you over the side and you can swim back to the States. I'll probably chum the area before I toss you overboard and I'll definitely slice you up so you'll bleed real well. Just so you know, I love to shark fish and you would be good bait."

The guy sharing the room was almost whimpering. The tall guy was still sneering at me when I left. Knowing we had installed a total security system on the boat, I went to the wheel house and turned on the monitors. I pushed a few buttons and the cabin came into focus. The guy was tossing around, trying to bust the chains he was locked in. I could see his mouth move and reached down to turn up the volume of the video system.

"Break loose, you wimp. Get loose and get me free. I'm going to kill that motherfucker. If you don't get me free, I'll kill you and butt fuck your corpse."

I almost began laughing, but watched as the guy in the top bunk kept scraping his cuffs against the wall until he got a couple of splinters loose. He immediately began working on his cuffs. He was able to unlock them and then began on his ankle chains.

Without waiting for him to get completely free, I went to the cabin calling for Nightfox to come with me.

I opened the door as the man swung his feet over the side of the bunk. With my Glock pointed at him I said, "Good job, you did that in record time. I think we'll have to put you somewhere special. Somewhere like over the side."

Nightfox locked him back up, but put him on the floor face down. We used another set of chains to hold him in place so he couldn't move in any direction. I told the guy with the bad knee, "You intimidated this man into making what is possibly the biggest mistake of his life, perhaps the biggest mistake of his very short life. Now, I want you to think about it and perhaps apologize to him. By the time he's been on the floor for a week, he'll hate you. Enjoy."

Nightfox asked me, "Should we let these two talk to each other?"

"Probably not. Gag them. We'll let them piss and shit on themselves a few days before we clean them up. I think they'll smell better to the sharks if we do it that way."

We went through each of the cabins with prisoners and found that none of the others had thought of trying to escape the same way. The heavyset guy that was obviously hired help, was sullen, but asked how his partner was. I told him, "As of this minute, he is being considered for shark bait. He and his roommate were trying to escape. That does not make me happy, so we may have some extra food for you."

The big man wrinkled his forehead as he looked at me trying to figure out whether I was pulling his chain or not.

I told the two deputies, "One of you can watch the prisoners on the closed circuit TV and one of you can visit each room at least every fifteen minutes. Nightfox and I will relieve you so we can all get some sleep a couple of hours at a time."

I said to Sam, "Find a place and bed down for a couple of hours. Someone will wake you and we'll rotate from that point on. We should have picked up a couple of more deputies."

Nightfox said, "Call Sarge and get a couple more. Have them sent out on one of those helicopters you guys have. They should be able to keep that quiet enough."

"Good idea. I'll call to see if we can get away with that."

Sarge thought the idea was a good one and hunted up a couple of single guys to join us. I idled down and basically washed around in the swells waiting for the other two men.

It took about an hour before the helicopter came overhead and both deputies tossed down a duffel bag then rappelled down a rope to the deck. Radio transmissions were kept to a minimum so no one would pick up on what was happening. It actually sounded like a couple of boats getting together to exchange bait.

We briefed the new guys and showed them the problem children. It was time for food, so I fixed us some steak, but I cut the prisoners meat up in little bites and mixed it with the vegetables. It was probably better than what they were used to, so I didn't feel bad. We had to let the guy face down on the floor up to pee and eat, but then put him back on the floor with a gag again.

The tall guy kept bitching and not eating, so we gave up trying to feed him. I think he got the message when we gagged him again and also put another set of chains on him and his roommate. No one gets out of three sets of chains with your arms behind your back.

We traveled continuously until we were off the coast of Mexico. I wanted to stay near a group of uninhabited islands off northern Mexico in the event that I needed to put these guys off the boat. If we stayed in the shadow of the islands, no one should be able to see us, even via satellite. I was able to get within about fifty feet of a rock wall and dropped two anchors fore and aft to hold us in place. We were hidden from any gulf traffic and hidden from the shore area that was twenty miles south of us.

To make us more invisible, I found the camo netting from one of the lockers and spread it over us. Now surveillance aircraft wouldn't be able to see us either. If they were using infrared searches they would see us, but the Coast Guard didn't use that on their fixed wing aircraft.

We sat there for three days. Being nice guys, we exercised the prisoners three times a day. Every other day, we stripped them down and washed them on deck so they could be watched by multiple people. They all needed a shave, but I didn't worry about that. I did let them brush their teeth daily, but that is just about the limit of the amenities. If one of them had to take a shit, we un-cuffed one hand from their waist and sat outside the john watching them. They could do their job and wipe themselves, but other than that, they were locked up.

The deputies kept up the constant barrage of questioning. They kept notebooks on each prisoner in order to keep digging deeper and deeper. By the third day, the heavy set guy was spilling his guts. We found out which company was trying to take over the other, and why they wanted S&S' secrets. He said that they had paid him and the tall guy to hire a contractor to get rid of the squealer in the hotel. They were going to eliminate the contractor when he came for his money, but we had upset that plan.

He had left the other two men at the hotel to join the tall guy, since he was supposed to be the primary contact for all subcontractors. He said so far, the guy had been a bust.

A couple of the corporate men admitted they were trying to put the other military contractor out of business and were concerned that S&S had come up with a product that could hurt their bid status. They felt they needed to know more about the product, and instead of asking about it, they figured on stealing the data.

We recorded everything the prisoners admitted and transmitted it back to Steve, Wanda, and the Bureau via satellite, totally untraceable. Just for fun, I sent copies of the interviews to John and the DOJ special prosecutor that had been appointed.

Day five, I called John. "Hey, John, what's the landscape looking like?"

"Christ, Chuck, the shit is still flowing through the fan. Wherever you are, they can't find you. They think you may be on a boat somewhere and they've searched every inch of the gulf. The closest they figure you are is in the Caribbean, hiding out on an island somewhere."

"Damn, John, they're close. Is there any movement to get to the bottom of this shit, or is the Pentagon still huffing and puffing?"

John said, "You've made a bunch of them nervous enough that a bunch of rank has retired and a couple of civilian big shots have resigned. Justice and the special prosecutor are trying to get inside, but those guys are walled in right now. Even with your interviews, Justice is slow investigating. They haven't assigned the Bureau to the case and they made the Tampa Bureau stop working the case."

"Tell you what, John, I'll call in a couple of days. I should get off the horn so they don't pinpoint me. Adios."

I hung up and shut the phone down. No sense in giving them an easy method to track me. Just for fun, I turned on my cell to see if I had a signal. Son of a gun, four bars. I shut it off real quick and went looking for the other men. I asked, "Do you have a cell phone and is it on?"

All of them produced a cell phone and all were turned off. I told them that we were within cell range, so it was good they were off as we could be traced that way. Just to be safe, I turned off all of the electronics in the wheel house. The only thing I left on was the ten mile radar with an alert for movement within the target range.

I checked the fuel and we had only used about fifteen percent. If we didn't travel anywhere, we could stay here for a month or more before having to look for fuel. We only had the small generator on, and we could even shut that down if need be. Our fresh food was lasting a lot longer than planned, plus we had nearly a month of canned goods.

As a week became two weeks, the confessions became more detailed with the corporate plans of nefarious operations becoming larger and larger. The corporate people we had caught, found out the other company was doing the same thing by trying to get hold of S&S data so they could scuttle anyone else's opportunity to get an additional foothold with the military.

When I called John near midnight, he answered and talked very guardedly. I told him I had to go and hung up. That wasn't like him, so I waited until about two AM and turned on the only cell phone that didn't have GPS built in.

John groggily answered, I asked, "Are they camping out in your living room?"

He answered, "No, they've left, but they were there with equipment when you called. They've lived with me since you called before. Listen, let's make this quick. Justice is on your side, but the Pentagon is still trying to make like they're clean and it's just the contractors. Find out more from your prisoners and let me know using the same way as you have been sending. See ya."

He hung up. Probably prudent, as we didn't need a big signature of where we were.

I was sitting up on deck when a couple of jets streaked across the horizon just off the deck. They were between Mexico and me so they wouldn't see me that way. I figured them for infrared, so I shut down the generator and made sure no one else was on deck. I went into the wheelhouse so I could watch.

The jets scorched the surface for about a half-hour going back and forth. They never did get close to us and never passed directly over us. Their infrared pictures wouldn't show us as a signature, so we should be fine.

I let the rest of the crew sleep while I checked on the prisoners continuously throughout the night. About five in the morning, I heard motor noise that wasn't in the air. It was some kind of boat.

The boat passed us on the other side of the island and in a little while it came back and passed us going the other way. I figured they would make another pass on our side of the island pretty soon, but hoped it would be closer to shore.

About nine, we watched a fifty foot Coast Guard Cutter power by about ten miles out. I was on top of the wheelhouse to see them and we should be below the horizon to them. If they did see something, our camouflage netting should make us fairly undetectable.

I kept putting ice into the refrigerator so what fresh stuff we had wouldn't spoil before I could turn the generator back on.

We watched as a C-130 passed directly overhead, probably with infrared search turned on. No one was on deck and we were all under cover, so we should be fine.

The C-130 was searching a grid and continued to search until it probably had to go for fuel. It came back pretty quick, so it must have had an inflight refueling meet. It searched continuously until about six, then headed in. The airplane had flown directly over us twice in its search for us.

I figured we probably looked like a rock beside the rock island we were next to.

I turned on the generator and listened to the radio receiver without turning on the transmitter. We heard the cutter reporting in, but they were next to the Mexican coast heading east.

We fed everyone and washed them down on deck. The escape artist said he would be good if we let him sit up for a while. I sat him on deck facing the stern and had a deputy sitting behind him to watch him. When it was time for bed, I did put a mattress down for him to lie face down on instead of being on the hard floor. I still gagged both of them, as I didn't need them conspiring.

That night, I transmitted a bunch of interviews to everyone concerned. These were very damning and named corporate executives, as well as Pentagon officials. If anyone wanted proof, they wouldn't have to look far.

Knowing that the satellite tracking would have been on, we had everything shut down and were under cover when the jets came flashing over us. An hour later, the C-130 searched the grid again. An hour after that, we heard the cutter moving slowly on the other side of the island. I wondered why they didn't come on this side.

When the cutter came back this way, it was only about five miles away. I had put another set of netting over the boat so it was even more hidden. It did give us a little more shade as the cabin air was off with the generators turned off.

At the two week mark, we were out of fresh food and had begun to use canned goods. I fished everyday, but the fishing sucked where we were.

That was before I found some Spam. I opened the can and used a small piece for bait.

No sooner than the hook and bait were about twenty feet down, I caught a very nice sea trout. I pulled it up and pretty soon, I caught another. We had fresh fish that night. I cooked everything on the alcohol stove with port holes open. I couldn't bring myself to turn on the generators and possibly get caught.

At twenty days, I decided it was time to go in. We had multiple written and signed confessions, plus video and sound confessions from everyone except the tall guy. I really wanted to toss him overboard, but that would be too obvious.

I told my people what we were going to do and we took down and stored the netting. When I fired up the generator, it took an hour for the cabins to cool down and a lot longer before the refrigerator became cool. We had been cautious with water and still had half a tank.

When I pulled up anchor, I felt a little giddy that we had been able to hide from the Coast Guard and probably the Navy for the length of time we did.

Instead of going directly northeast to home, I motored north about a hundred miles then turned east as if I were coming from south Texas. A C-130 passed over us, but didn't circle for another pass. One of the targets on my fifty mile radar closed for a while then turned back south after the C-130 went over.

About twenty miles out, I called Steve's cell to get him to have the Marshal's Service bring a few vehicles out to the docks. Before I was ten miles out, Jan called to tell me we didn't have a welcoming committee. She said all of the Pentagon investigators had left the area, but the Bureau was still restricted from investigating the case.

When we docked, Steve, Tiny, Sarge, and Jan were there along with a half dozen deputies to take charge of our prisoners. Our objective was to take them to the jail in the Federal building and keep them there until someone found them. Jan said they were still being held without bail, so Sarge just said the prisoners were being held incognito to keep them safe.

I told Sam, "Go visit with Maria and don't stick your head out until I call you. I'm not sure how worked up some of these people may be, so we need to keep you out of sight, and I'll keep my head down for a bit. I'll keep in touch to let you know what's going on."

The first thing I did was to duplicate all of our original recordings and video confessions. I shipped a set off to John, the Pentagon investigators, the special prosecutor for the DOJ, and one to my friends within the Secret Service. The originals were locked in the safe within my office at work. Since no one would expect me to have a safe there, I figured it would be a safe place.

I walked into my home about eight in the evening. The entire group was sitting at the big table, talking about the upcoming European trip. The chatter stopped as they looked at my unkempt, unshaven appearance. There was a moment or two of hesitations before all of them converged on me at once.

There were many questions and requests for me to clean up and shave. After hugs and kisses from my ladies, I spent a half-hour in the bathroom showering and shaving. It felt good to have hot water for a change.

When I returned to the kitchen area, a meal had been prepared, along with a big salad. Momma and the two girls were now there to welcome me home, along with Steve, Sue, Mercy, Kathy, and Juanita. Steve had a drink poured for me and said that I would have to come over for a beer later.