Jack Beale 00 - Dangerous Shoals

off the table. She refused to move and rubbed against the lamp again. He dropped the CD on the table, grabbed her, and said, “What has gotten into you?”
    She squirmed out of his hands and thumped onto the floor. Before he could move, she immediately jumped back up onto the table. Jack reached for her again, and just as his hands were about to get hold of her, she jumped away. He was slightly off balance and hit the table, which caused the lamp to rock violently. He grabbed for it, missed, and the lamp hit the floor, shattering. “Damn it Cat! What is wrong with you?”
    Cat, startled by the crash of the lamp, bolted. Swearing under his breath he began to clean up the broken lamp while Cat peeked from around a corner. As he swept up the last shards, Cat reappeared. She mrowed softly and acted as if nothing had happened. He glared at her and growled, “Don’t you give me that innocent act.”
    In response, Cat sauntered past him, found a sunny spot on the floor, and stretched out as if all she had wanted was to take a nap in the sun.
    “Cat, you are so weird. That’s right―you go take a nap. I’m going to do what I had started out to do: find out what is on this disc.”
    She looked up and mrowed again as if to say, “Good idea.”
    He found the small portable CD player that Max kept on the coffee table and put the disc in. His hand shook as he pressed the play key. The disc began to spin, but that was all. Cat mrowed and watched him intently as he ejected the disc and went around the corner to the antique secretary where he kept his computer. She followed him and watched as he pushed the disc into the CD slot. Again he could hear it beginning to spin. After the screen lit up, an error message appeared. The disc was unreadable; did he want to format it? He didn’t, so he clicked on the cancel icon and ejected the disc. Cat mrowed and jumped onto the secretary. Then she stood next to his computer and watched him intently as he removed the disc from the machine.
    “Oh, you’re back. You know, I have a feeling that there is something on this disc, and if it’s what I think it is…” He stopped before saying anything else. It was as if speaking his thoughts aloud would make it so, and he wasn’t sure that he was ready for that. Hell, maybe he was making a big fuss about nothing and the disc really belonged to Max. He‘d ask her later.
    He grabbed an empty case for the disc, placed it in the case, then left it next to the computer, and returned to the shop. The afternoon was passing quickly and he wanted to get the CD player back together and onto the boat.
    Half an hour later, he walked back to Irrepressible with the CD player in hand. He had killed off nearly the entire afternoon. The sun was already beginning its downward plunge toward the horizon. It was still warm out, but it was different from the midday heat. Now, it was more residual rather than directly from the sun. As he walked down the dock, player in hand, a pair of eyes watched him intently through powerful binoculars. “What is he up to?” the observer mumbled under his breath.

CHAPTER 65
    JACK REINSTALLED THE CD player in Irrepressible . He put another CD in, pressed play, and it worked. That was a pleasant surprise since he had feared that the mechanism might have been damaged when he had forced that second disc into it. “Damn, I’m good,” he said aloud, not really listening to the sounds that came from the speakers.
    “Jack.” He heard his name. “Are you down there?”
    It was Max. He looked out the companionway and saw that she was standing at the top of the ramp. He waved and she began calumping down the ramp. He climbed out into the cockpit to greet her and gave her a hand getting on board. Almost before he could say hello, she said, “What is that noise?”
    Jack looked at her. It took a moment for him to realize that she was talking about the music coming from inside the boat. “The music?”
    “Is that what you call it?”
    “Sorry. I had to fix the player earlier. I just reinstalled it, so I threw a disc in to see if it worked.”
    She made a face. “Where did you get that?”
    “I think it was a gag gift from last years Christmas party.”
    “And you kept it?”
    “Yeah,” he said, blushing with embarrassment.
    “It’s pretty awful.”
    He listened for a second before replying. Then with a slight chuckle he said, “It really is. Isn’t it?’
    She nodded in agreement as he went below to shut it