Jack Beale 00 - Dangerous Shoals

with her hands on her hips, she gestured, glared, and shouted all at the same time. “Daniel! You son-of-a-bitch. What are you doing here? You could have killed all of us! You bastard! You’re supposed to be dead! What do you think you are doing? You abandoned me in Belize! Why are you doing this?” This was all said in one long, loud, breath.
    When she paused, Daniel, still grinning, said, “Sorry.”
    This brought on another tirade. Jack finally moved to her side. He put his hands on her shoulders, pulled her toward him, and slowly turned her until she was facing him. He looked into her wild eyes and in a calm, quiet voice said, “Max. Slow down. Let’s find out what’s going on.”

CHAPTER 32
    JACK TURNED BACK just as the boat Daniel was on came close alongside amidships. Daniel reached out, steadied himself by grasping one of the stays, and stepped onto Irrepressible . “I need to talk to you, both of you.”
    “I’ll wait for you.” The driver of the other boat shouted as he gunned his engines and sped off until he was perhaps a quarter mile away. Irrepressible rocked violently from the wake left by the sudden departure, which forced Jack to grab the wheel for support. Max sat down hard while Daniel held onto the stay.
    They both stared at their new passenger in silence. Then Max stood and went below without a word while Jack continued staring at Daniel.
    “So what the hell is this all about?” asked Jack. He could see Max below in the cabin wiping her eyes.
    Daniel moved toward the cockpit. “First, let me apologize for Freddie. He’s a good man, but a bit impulsive.”
    “Impulsive. Is that what you call being a complete asshole?”
    Daniel didn’t respond. Instead, he stepped down into the cockpit.
    Max climbed out of the cabin, ignored Daniel as she brushed by him, and returned to Jack’s side.
    “It’s time for an explanation,” said Jack.
    Daniel spoke slowly and with purpose. He looked straight at them, but focused on Max. “Max, I’m sorry. I did what I had to do and after you hear my story, I hope you’ll understand. I don’t expect you to forgive me, but I do need you, both of you, to listen.”
    He sat down. Neither Max nor Jack said anything as they sat down opposite him. Irrepressible ’s diesel continued to purr at low idle, and save for a halyard occasionally slapping against the mast as she rocked gently on the flat sea, it was silent.
    Daniel finally spoke again. “Max, do you remember when we were in Belize and that black boat first went by us?”
    She remained silent and still.
    “As soon as I saw it, I knew that I had been found, and I knew that as soon as word got back to my employer, he would order my elimination. In a nutshell, that’s why I abandoned you and faked my death. I’m sure it would have worked perfectly except that he showed up and saw me leaving,” Daniel nodded toward Jack, “and if he knew I was alive, then I knew that the odds were against my remaining hidden. From that moment I knew that eventually my plan would unravel and sooner or later my employer would find me. I made it back to the States and needed an insurance policy if I were to stand any kind of a chance at staying alive.” He paused, waiting for some kind of a reaction from either Max or Jack. Seeing that there was none, he continued. “You don’t need all the details. Suffice it to say I befriended a woman who worked in my former employer’s office and convinced her to help me. She copied some files onto a CD for me. Later, we had dinner together and she gave them to me. As I was leaving town the next morning, I read in the papers that she had been murdered. I was surprised with the speed and ruthlessness with which he reacted and that told me that what I had was more valuable that I had imagined. The papers had a field day with it, as you can imagine. In one form or another, all their headlines decried the violence of her murder. She had been tortured before finally being killed. The papers said ‘for no apparent reason,’ but I knew differently.”
    Max sucked in her breath and stared at Daniel in disbelief. Jack just stared.
    He continued, “There was nothing I could do. I could only imagine how she had suffered and what she must have told her killer before she died. It’s a safe bet that now he knows I’m not dead. I’ve been on the run ever since. I know how he works. He’ll search out anyone from my past and use them to get to me, and that means you, Max. After