Wood's Wall Read Online Free PDF Page A

I?”
    “I’m afraid not, kiddo.”
    They got up and hugged. "Be careful down there. You have some enemies.”

 
     
     
     
     
     

    6
    Pete looked around the house in disbelief. It looked like a scene from Caligula. Four unconscious, half-dressed bodies were strewn among the cushions pulled off the couches. Liquor bottles, mostly empty, sat on the coffee table. A pile of white powder was piled on the glass of a picture taken from the wall. An open brick lay on the kitchen counter. 
    He panicked and went for the storeroom. The gear they had used to hide the cooler looked untouched. They were either really careful or had taken the brick out on the boat and hid it. He remembered losing count as they loaded them into the cooler. There were fifty when they were laid on the deck of the boat - how many were left in the cooler? He remembered counting to at least forty before he got distracted. 
    He moved the surrounding gear and stared at the cooler. He opened the lid; it looked the same. One by one, he took the bricks out of the cooler, and started to stack them. Sweat poured down his brow from the heat in the enclosed space. 
    He had four stacks of ten laid out when he removed the last bricks. At five, he realized they were short. Forty-eight. He double-checked his count as he replaced them, and paused when he noticed that one package was slightly different. It was hard and slightly smaller. He hadn’t noticed anything different before, but he hadn’t handled every one - Jeff had helped him. It was slightly smaller but had the same outer wrapping. Curious, he removed a corner of the wrapping, and saw the dull sheen of metal.
    He placed the unusual brick to the side and loaded the cooler again. His brain was swirling - working on full power now — the missing inventory made him sure that his friends, now partners, had liberated a brick each for themselves. If it came up, he would confront them and say he took a brick to even things up. The gear back in place he went back to the house.
    He passed the couples still prone on the floor, pausing to make sure each was still breathing. Satisfied he went to his room and stashed the brick in the closet. Back in the living room he surveyed the scene again, trying to decide whether to wake the dead. The wind was down, and it would be another good fishing day, though they’d get a late start. In the end, he decided to load the boat and then wake them. The open water would be a good spot for privacy. They needed to have a board meeting, away from the women, so he could sell them on his plan. 
     
    ***
     
    Dan and Jeff looked green before they even left the dock, and Pete relished the payback as he watched them, surprised that both held onto the contents of their stomachs - sure that he wouldn’t be able to if he’d partied like that. They’d only agreed to go after they each had another line from the mountain of drugs on the coffee table. He doubted whether it had helped much. Now, he continued the torture as he took his time bringing the boat on plane, letting it pound a few more waves before accelerating. Before long, Dan and Jeff were starting to nod off, succumbing to the rhythm of the boat as they made their way to the Gulf Stream, twelve miles off the reef.
    Pete slowed as they approached a weed patch. He yelled for Dan and Jeff to get up and get lines in the water. Frustrated at their lack of response he set the boat in neutral and started to set out two rods himself. As soon as the second line was out he went back to the helm and nudged the throttle forward, slowly moving the boat towards the weeds. 
    The reel screamed as line came off it - a fish jumping fifty feet off the boat. The alarm woke Dan and Jeff who instantly went for the rods. The fish came in easily. It was a schoolie, just longer than the twenty inch limit. The school swarmed around the boat after following their lost comrade. Ordinarily they would have kept the hooked fish in the water to keep the