The Tears of Dark Water (16 page)

Mary gave her a compassionate look. “I imagine the TV crews will be here by lunchtime.”

Vanessa sat down on one of the Queen Anne chairs in the living room, her mind whirling like an unsteady top. Her nightmare was about to become national headline news. Skipper padded up to her, and she scratched him behind the ears, grateful for the distraction.

“How do we handle them?” she asked at last.

“The short answer is we don’t,” Strong replied. A twenty-year veteran of the Bureau and now chief of security at the Sagittarius Group, he was an imposing barrel of a man, with the thick limbs of a rugby player and a face that looked as if it had been chiseled out of marble. “Mary and I will monitor the coverage and let you know if something comes up. The best thing you can do is ignore it.”

Mary took the baton from Strong. “We’ve already maximized the privacy settings on your social media accounts. There’s only so much the press can get from public sources. But now would be a good time to bring the people close to you into the loop. They need to know what’s coming.”

“I’ll talk to Bob Rogers at the firm,” Curtis said.

Vanessa watched her father-in-law walk to the tall, east-facing windows and retrieve his smartphone from his suit jacket. Once a star linebacker for the Navy Midshipmen, he had filled out in middle age and was a tad on the portly side, but, as Yvonne jested in the British accent she still carried from childhood, he was as formidable as a grizzly bear, and equally friendly.

“I’m going to call Aster,” Vanessa said.

She took her iPhone into the dining room and dialed her friend’s mobile number. Before the call connected, a thought occurred to her that sent a shiver up her spine.
What if the press finds out about Quentin’s suspension? What if they find out about the drugs?
She cut off the call and forced herself to think rationally. The school’s records were protected by privacy laws. No criminal charges had ever been filed. The lawyers Curtis hired were bound by confidentiality. The press had no reason to search for skeletons because they were irrelevant to the hijacking.

She shrugged off her misgivings and called Aster again. Before she could complete a sentence, her friend asked what was wrong. Vanessa delivered her account simply, embellishing nothing.

“What can I do?” Aster asked softly.

“Talk to Chad and Emily,” Vanessa replied. “I’m not sure when I’ll be in again.”

“We’ll cover your appointments. And I’ll cancel the St. Michael’s reservation. I don’t want you worrying about a thing except your family.”

“I already heard from the press,” Vanessa said. “They may try to contact you.”

“There’s no way any of us will talk to them.”

Vanessa sighed, borrowing strength from her friend. “Okay. I’ll keep you posted.”

Aster took a breath. “Keep your chin up. This is going to work out.”

Vanessa ended the call and returned to the living room, only to hear the house phone ring again.
Not another reporter
, she stewed silently, but the number had an international exchange. She let it go to voicemail and then listened to the message.

“Hi, Mrs. Parker,” said a sweet adolescent voice, sounding worried and embarrassed. “This is Ariadne Wilson in Australia. We’ve never spoken, but Quentin says he told you about me. We met in the Cook Islands when my family was sailing the Pacific.” The girl paused, then forged ahead. “We talk every day now, usually by email. I haven’t heard from him in two days, and I’m starting to worry. Have you heard anything? I’d be very grateful if you would call me back.”

In spite of her dread, Vanessa felt an unexpected twinge of joy. It was true then, what Daniel had written about Quentin. Something miraculous had happened on the voyage. As a young man, he had always been clumsy around girls, approaching them in awkward ways that invariably backfired. Vanessa knew the names of most of his crushes. They had always been popular girls, and none had returned his affection. Somehow with Ariadne it had been different. Vanessa pressed the redial button, hoping the girl was as strong as Daniel suggested.

“Ariadne,” she said, “this is Vanessa Parker. I’m afraid I have some bad news.”

Ariadne gasped once at the beginning of the story but listened to the rest without comment. When Vanessa finished, she heard the girl crying softly. It was enough to break her heart.

“I’ll give you my email address,” Vanessa offered, “and I’ll send you updates when I can.”

“They’re going to be okay, aren’t they?” Ariadne asked plaintively.

Vanessa spoke with more conviction than she felt. “They’re going to be fine.”

When the call ended, she looked longingly at her violin. In the swirl of her emotions, she needed an outlet, and music was the surest form of release. But she couldn’t play before an audience. It would only increase her stress. She went to the foyer and grabbed her peacoat off the rack, whistling for Skipper to come.

“I’m going for a walk,” she said to anyone listening.

She left the house by the back door and walked briskly to the river. Skipper trotted beside her, as if sensing her need for company. The air was chilly but warming, the forest dappled with fall color. She stuffed her hands into her coat pockets and watched a sloop with a red hull navigate the channel toward the Naval Academy Bridge.
Why couldn’t they have sailed around the Pacific like Ariadne’s family?
she mused.
Why did they have to cross the Indian Ocean?
But, of course, she knew the answer. Daniel had talked about sailing around the world since she had met him, and he had passed along the dream to Quentin.

She didn’t stop at the dock like she usually did. Instead, she followed the riverbank to the edge of her property and then returned through the forest, increasing her pace until she was almost running. She heard Skipper chuffing beside her, his feet clicking on the hard earth. The breeze off the land rustled the trees and sent leaves skittering across the ground. She reached the house feeling invigorated. A swift walk wasn’t as effective as Mozart in restoring her equilibrium, but it was a close second.

Mary Patterson approached her when she entered the living room. “We got proof of life,” she announced. “Paul Derrick spoke to Daniel. The pirates haven’t harmed them.”

Vanessa felt relief flood through her. She took off her coat and sat down in the living room across from Curtis and Yvonne. Duke Strong was standing beside the fireplace, typing something on his mobile phone. “Now what?” she asked.

“The Navy is ramping up the pressure,” Mary explained. “They’ve made clear that they won’t let the pirates take them to Somalia.”

“What do you mean?” Vanessa asked, not quite comprehending. “What if they don’t comply?”

Mary’s reply was matter-of-fact. “They don’t have a choice.”

Vanessa felt a pang of anxiety. “That sounds more like an ultimatum than a negotiation.”

For the first time, Vanessa heard Mary measure her words. “The government’s principal concern is to ensure the safety of your family. If they go to Somalia, it increases the risk.”

Vanessa shook her head. “You said a ransom might be the safest way to end this. It doesn’t sound like the Navy is giving that a chance.” She took a moment to think. She didn’t like this new development. Something about it didn’t feel right. She looked at her father-in-law and Duke Strong. “I’d like to talk to the two of you in private.” She glanced at Mary. “I hope you don’t mind.”

“Not at all,” the FBI agent said.

Vanessa walked down the hall to Daniel’s office and flipped the light switch beside the door. The room was a shrine to nautical history, with old charts in gilt-edged frames, a polished globe and a gimbal compass, an antique sextant, and a bevy of ship models in glass cases. The only concessions to the modern age were the iMac and printer on the captain’s desk.

Duke Strong whistled when he stepped inside. “Nice office.”

“You should see his father’s,” she quipped, tossing a glance at Curtis.

When they had taken seats, she got to the point. “I’m concerned about the government’s position. I’m grateful for what they’re doing, but they’re taking a hard line. I don’t understand it.”

Strong held out his hands. “It’s simple, actually. You see this as a personal matter. The government doesn’t. They think about it through the lens of policy. Piracy costs the U.S. and other maritime countries billions of dollars every year. They want it to stop. If these pirates get a payday, the incentive for piracy increases. So they’re not going to let them get what they want.”

Vanessa shook her head. “They don’t have a child on the sailboat.”

Strong nodded. “I’m not trying to be cynical. They care about your family. But they’re looking at the big picture. The government wants to eradicate piracy and hostage taking. In their minds, the way to do it is to confront the hostage takers with overwhelming force and asking a basic question: ‘Do you want to fight and die or put down your weapons and live?’”

Vanessa spoke her next question in a near whisper: “What if the pirates choose to die?”

Strong shrugged. “The entire policy framework rests on the human instinct to survive.”

Suddenly, Vanessa felt trapped. She looked out the window at the forest. “So what you’re saying is that Daniel and Quentin are pawns in some kind of geopolitical game.”

“That’s an unflattering way of putting it, but yes,” Strong replied.

Vanessa turned to her father-in-law, thinking of his many friends in government. “What if you made a few calls? You could tell them to back down.”

Curtis sat statuesque, his hands on the arms of his chair. “If this were just about a ransom, you know we would pay it. But this is bigger than us, Vanessa. They’re not going to listen.”

“How can you say that?” she demanded. “My
son
is out there. They don’t have the right to roll the dice with his life!”

Curtis met her eyes. “My son is there, too,” he said softly. “And my grandson.”

“Look,” Strong interjected, “the SEALs are great at what they do. They got Captain Phillips out. Also, there’s a downside to letting Daniel and Quentin reach Somalia. They could end up in the hands of al-Shabaab. That’s a scenario you don’t even want to think about.”

Vanessa buried her face in her hands. She had spent her entire adult life weeding out the imponderables that made her childhood unbearable. She had married a stable man in a stable family—imperfect but predictable. She had achieved academic success in a credible field and joined her best friend in starting a medical practice catering to the low-income and refugee populations in D.C.—not too lofty, but important enough for personal satisfaction. She had been careful, meticulous, always in the driver’s seat. Now everything in her world was spinning out of control.
The SEALs. Somalia. The Shabaab. How did we get to this point?

She sat up suddenly, possessed of an idea. The only way to defeat helplessness was to take action. She walked back to the living room, her eyes ablaze with purpose. Mary Patterson was standing by the windows, talking on her BlackBerry. She ended the call quickly when she saw Vanessa.

“Everything okay?” she asked.

“No,” Vanessa replied simply. “I want to talk to Paul Derrick.”

Paul

The Indian Ocean

04°16´50˝S, 54°09´06˝E

November 10, 2011

Derrick was wrong about the helicopter. It evoked no response from the pirates. The Seahawk closed to within half a mile of the
Renaissance
and circled it twice, shooting video, before banking away and taking up station a mile off the sailboat’s beam. In the twenty minutes it took to gather the footage, no one appeared on the deck of the yacht or hailed the
Gettysburg
over the radio. The
Renaissance
continued its forward march toward Somalia as if guided by an invisible spirit.

After a while, Derrick broke the silence. “
Renaissance
, this is
Gettysburg
, come in. Over.”

But no one answered.

After a few more failed attempts, Redman called a conference with Masters and the negotiation team on the bridge wing. The tropical air was stifling—over ninety degrees Fahrenheit—and the humidity off the ocean was so thick that Derrick felt like he was breathing underwater.

“I want to know why they’re not talking,” said the SEAL commander, raising his voice over the wind. “And I want to know how to change that.”

Derrick met Redman’s eyes. “They’re not talking because they’re holding all the cards. They don’t need what we’re offering, and they have time on their side. If they reach the coast, they win.”

Redman frowned. “You’re telling me negotiation won’t work?”

“Not at all. What I’m saying is that negotiation is hard to do on a deadline. If the sailboat weren’t moving, we could wear the pirates down. Eventually, they’d come to the bargaining table. But as long as they’re making headway, they have no incentive to engage us.”

“You’re saying we need to disable the sailboat.”

Derrick shrugged. “Disable it or slow it down. Either way, we buy time and reinforce to the pirates that they can’t ignore us.”