One Minute Out

I slow and peek around the corner to the aft deck, and here I see a couple of deckhands winching the tender, along with one guy wearing a dark polo and holding a subgun in one hand and a radio up to his ear in the other. He’s facing the saloon, and he’s between me and the diving equipment I need.

I think about just pulling the Glock from the pack hanging from my chest and shooting him, but I need a few seconds to get the tank valve opened and to put the equipment on, and even if I put the suppressor on my weapon first, everybody on the deck is still going to hear the gunshot.

So instead I just start walking towards the armed man purposefully but nonthreateningly.

He’s twenty feet from me when he lowers the walkie-talkie and looks in my direction. But all he sees is a diver in a wetsuit, his face partially hidden by the hood, heading to the scuba rack. My pack probably looks a little weird; not many people dive with luggage, but he’s unsure enough to allow me to close on him.

Another few steps and it won’t matter what he does.

The man on the loudspeaker says something else, and the guard in the polo swings his submachine gun towards me, but I’m two steps away now and I cover them faster than he can fire. I knock the weapon away, spear the man in the throat, and slam my knee into his face as he doubles forward.

The deck crew begins shouting; I reach for the guard’s weapon, but he crumples to the ground before I can wrench it away.

Giving up on both the gun and stealth, giving up on everything but getting my ass in the water, I lunge for the scuba rig I placed in the corner. Hefting the fifty pounds of gear, I spin back towards the stern. The deckhands look like they want to make trouble, and my hands are full so fighting them is not an option, so I juke to the left and run for the starboard side, and they give chase.

A gunshot cracks on my left as I make it to the starboard deck; I shift my body around as I hit the railing and start to go over, hoping to use the tank as a makeshift bulletproof vest.

Another gunshot rocks the night and I feel the impact as the bullet strikes my tank just as I tumble over the side, falling headfirst with all my gear slung over my shoulder.

Splashing into the cold black water, I realize I’m clear from the immediate threat of guns, but I’ve landed into a new threat. I’m heavily laden with equipment and weights, and I’m descending quickly.

I could let go of everything, just allow the tank and equipment to drop, but I won’t do that because I’m wearing a wetsuit that adds buoyancy to my already buoyant body, so I’ll just shoot to the surface.

And the surface is where the jackasses with guns are.

Somehow I have to open the air valve on the tank, get the vest onto my body and buckled in, arrest the descent by adding air to the vest, and then find my regulator and get it into my mouth so I can breathe.

With my eyes closed, because my mask is in the pack on my chest.

All before I drown.

But I’m not thinking about this, I’m doing this. I pull the entire rig off my shoulder and place it in front of me below my pack. Wrapping my legs around the steel tank, I crank open the valve. As my ears scream from my rapid descent, I muscle my way into the BCD, snap one of the three quick-release buckles to keep it on, and whip my hand around wildly for my regulator.

I find the hose and grab the mouthpiece, then pop it into my mouth, inhaling deeply.

Saltwater rushes into my mouth and lungs.

Gagging, I realize the bullet that hit the tank must have ricocheted and damaged the hose to the regulator, so I release it and yank down on the emergency regulator, tucked into my vest, knowing that if the hose on the octopus is also damaged, then I’m a dead man.

The panic welling in my chest now is as painful as the pressure against my eardrums.

I put the octopus in my mouth, push the purge button so I can spit out the seawater, and then I try a shallow breath.

Air has never felt so good going into my body.

Breathing normally now, I continue to sink, so I pump just a little air into my vest to slow my descent, then open my pack to retrieve my mask. I get it over my eyes, and then clear it of water by lifting the bottom of it off my cheeks and breathing out my nose.

Then I pinch my nose through my mask and simulate several sneezes, and this quickly regulates the pressure in my ears and the pounding pain goes away.

I pull my fins out and slip them over my boots, then more securely tighten my BCD to my body. I tie off the regulator hose to slow the loss of air from the tank. It continues to leak—I can feel bubbles brushing against my face—but it’s better than it was.

Finally convinced I’m not going to die in the next ten seconds, I look at the illuminated depth gauge and find myself nearly seventy feet below the surface. From the deck of the Primarosa it looked like about five hundred yards to the nearest shoreline, and farther to the marina at Rovinj, so with the leak in the hose I don’t have any time to wait around.

I add more air to my vest, finally arresting my descent at eighty feet, then pull the red flashlight and turn it on. With it I see I am ten feet above the sandy and rocky ocean floor. I turn off the light and begin kicking to the east, using the illuminated compass on my BCD to guide me.

That went well, I think with no small amount of sarcasm.

 

* * *

 

• • •

Jaco Verdoorn leapt off the back of La Primarosa and into the tender. Already three Greeks armed with submachine guns and powerful flashlights were on board, and the tender captain fired the engine and spun the craft tightly back around to the east.

“Watch for bubbles!” Verdoorn ordered the men. He snatched a light from the hands of one of the gangsters, knowing his handgun was no more useful than the other weapons on board against a man more than a couple feet below the surface.

He was furious now, wild with rage. This was all bad; the death of the Greek, the poor security of the yacht that allowed the assassin to board, the inevitable questions that would come from Cage about Verdoorn’s own actions that did not prevent this . . . but still, Jaco recognized that the prevailing emotion he felt as they shot over the water scanning back and forth with the flashlights was one of incredible excitement. He wondered if he, right now, was closer to killing the infamous Gray Man than any other man had ever been, and he relished this opportunity more than anything he’d ever done in his life.

Jaco was in the zone.

As the Zodiac began weaving left and right, covering virtually the only track the diver below could have reasonably taken to get to land, Verdoorn called into his radio back to La Primarosa. “I want three divers suited up and armed with spear guns. Put them in the reserve tender and send them to our position. I saw him when he went in the water and he did not have a spear gun. We’re going to kill him right here, right now!”

Seconds later one of the Greeks at the bow shouted. “Bubbles! One o’clock! Twenty meters!”