Death Echo

that some people will endure any kind of weather to avoid crowds. Hikers and kayakers, particularly. The fact that it’s after the first week in October and the weather is dodgy…” She shrugged. “It keeps the summer mobs away.”
    Demidov glanced around. Crowd wasn’t a word he would have thought of in the same sentence as Port Renfrew. It was the end of the road. Literally. Like the car they had driven here, the town had a weary, hard-used air. He had parked the vehicle in an empty lot with keys inside. If someone wanted to steal the car, Demidov wished him luck. There was almost no petrol in the tank.
    â€œBring back enough food and water for a day,” he said.
    Without a word, Lina climbed onto the dock and went in search of provisions. Like loose wiring, she clicked in and out of touch with reality. Constant fear was numbing.
    Except when it wasn’t.

69
    DAY SIX
TOFINO
6:42 P.M.
    T he evening air was cold, damp, with an edge that told of winter rolling down from the Aleutians. The harbor itself was slick and quiet, a black satin that reflected pieces of the pastel sky when the clouds and local lighting allowed.
    The wide, blunt, plastic kayaks bobbing gently by the rental dock were a scuffed-up red. The color didn’t worry Mac or Emma. At night, red disappeared easily into black, which was why many emergency crews preferred a neon kind of yellow-green.
    Mac watched the pocket harbor of Tofino with the same binoculars he had been using since dawn. Only one fuel dock was still open. It was a fairly large place with an attached store and chandlery. For someone needing fuel and charts, it was a magnet.
    Emma prayed that the store and fuel would draw in Black Swan or Blackbird, whichever nameplate was on the boat. She had a legal document that allowed them to repossess Blackbird ’s twin. All they had to do was sneak aboard and take over the ship.
    Yeah, right.
    But that was the best plan anyone had come up with. Certainly the only one that had a chance of keeping a lid on all the need-to-know-only possibilities that Blackbird was the center of.
    She lifted her own binoculars and focused on the gloaming beyond the chain of islets and rocks that protected Tofino from the open ocean. If her memory still worked, another element had been added to the scene.
    A spot on the horizon had become a black-hulled ship.
    â€œMac.”
    â€œI see her. Damn, but she’s a pretty boat.”
    â€œToo bad she’s gone over to the dark side.”
    He smiled grimly. “We’re about to take care of that. Come on. By the time we get in position, Amanar and Lovich should be fueling.”
    Emma lowered the binoculars and saw Mac frowning at the kayaks.
    â€œProblem?” she asked.
    â€œGuess what’s the most dangerous form of watercraft on the ocean, including personal watercraft and aircraft carriers?”
    She looked at the fat kayaks. “Don’t tell me.”
    â€œOkay.”
    â€œIs that why Faroe put a roll of duct tape in your gear? To keep these afloat?”
    â€œHandcuffs,” Mac said.
    Emma blinked. “I thought that was what the dental floss was for.”
    He laughed.
    She maneuvered into her plastic tub. There was no spray skirt to keep water out, but her clothes were designed to keep her dry. Dark, one-piece, fitted, stretchy, the special gear was warm and almost as waterproof as a dive suit. Neoprene gloves, reef shoes, a dark knit cap, a delicate headset, waterproof belly bag for personal gear, and a flotation harness completed her outfit.
    Mac stretched against the black waterproof gear he wore. The length was good, the reef shoes fit, and the shoulders were too tight. He was glad no one had thought of waterproof hoods. They pulled all but the shortest hair and made your scalp sweat. The small back-pack and flat flotation harness he wore were simply there, like a wristwatch, unnoticed until needed.
    He eased into his kayak and looked at Emma. She was poised, waiting for him, double-ended paddle at the ready. A wind riffled over the smooth harbor. Though the water was warmer than in the open ocean, the wind smelled like winter.
    Mac and Emma paddled slowly away from shore, waiting for old, unused reflexes to assert themselves. By the time they had crossed the little harbor, neither of them had to think about every shift and motion of paddle and kayak.
    They paddled quietly toward the fuel dock, skirting anchored commercial fish