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man said, Sean, you have a way of finding things…or they have a way of finding you. Maybe it’s because you have the courage to look under the rocks.”
    “I’ve got to fix a bilge pump on Jupiter . See you later.”
    Kim watched O’Brien step out the restaurant door facing the marina. She looked through the open window as he walked down the long dock, the sound of laughing gulls in the warm breeze, a flock of the white pelicans sailing over the moored boats.
    She glanced down at her tanned upper arms, the warm breeze doing nothing to make her goose bumps go away.

N ick Cronus stuck his head out of the open window of the wheelhouse and shouted to O’Brien, “Sean, great timing—grab the stern line, and tie it to the white cleat.” Nick reversed the engines of his forty-foot fishing boat and backed into the slip as easily as a New York cabbie parallel parking. He stepped down from the wheelhouse and tossed O’Brien a rope. Max paced the dock, eyes bright, barking twice while Nick quickly climbed back in the captain’s chair and worked the bow-thrusters, inching the boat closer to the dock.
    O’Brien tied the stern line and walked to the bow, Nick adjusting the engine on St. Michael , working against the rising tide and wind out of the east. O’Brien grabbed the rope on the bow, rapidly tying it to a cleat. Nick shot his brown arm out the window, killing the engine, giving O’Brien the thumbs-up sign. Max cocked her head, watching Nick climb down from the wheelhouse. “Hot Dog,” he said, scooping Max off the dock with one large hand. “I caught a lot of fish out there. Gonna cook some after I sell some. Sound good? Hell yeah it sounds good ‘cause Uncle Nicky is hungry.”
    O’Brien smiled. “Between you and Kim, Max will forever turn her nose up at dog food.”
    “That’s because ‘lil Max is the queen of the marina, and she knows it.” Nick laughed and set Max down in St. Michael’s cockpit. The fishing boat had the seafaring look and lineage of Greek boats that sailed and fished the Mediterranean Sea for centuries.
    Nick reached inside a large cooler and pulled out two cans of beer. He popped the top on one, taking a long pull, his eyes watering. He used the back of his hand to wipe the beer foam from his bushy moustache, handing the second beer to O’Brien. “Cheers, Sean. I’ve been at sea five days. Didn’t catch nothing the first three days. I say a little prayer and bam! I’m toasting to a damn good catch. Amen, brother.” He touched the gold cross hanging from his neck and knocked back a second long swallow from the can, shaved ice running down the side and splattering on the top of his brown feet.
    Born on the Greek island of Mykonos forty-four years ago, Nick Cronus’s accent was still as thick as his mop of curly black hair. He had the shoulders of a pro linebacker, ham-sized forearms, and black eyes that smiled from an olive-skinned face tanned the color of light tea. He had a generous and yet fearless heart. Three years earlier, O’Brien pulled two bikers off Nick, saving his life in a brutal bar fight taken into a parking lot. And since that day, Nick said he and O’Brien were “brothers for life.”
    O’Brien nodded. “Good to hear you did well out there. What’d you catch?”
    “Got about a hundred pounds of red snapper. Maybe another seventy-five in grouper. A half dozen mackerel. I’ll sell ‘em to Johnson Seafood this afternoon. Old man Johnson prefers to pay me in cash. I don’t have a problem with that.” Nick grinned and finished his can of beer, crushing it with one hand. He gestured with his head toward the dock. “Look who’s here looking for a handout. My buddy, Ol Joe.”
    Max growled when a large black and orange cat sauntered down the dock and sat less than ten feet behind St. Michael . Nick said, “Maxie, you may be queen of the marina, but Ol’ Joe is king of the docks. That cat is the Scarface of the harbor.” Nick reached in a fish cooler,