Free Allah's Scorpion by David Hagberg Page B

nothing was amiss. They were exactly where they were supposed to be, there were no hazards to navigation ahead, no other shipping on intercept courses, and yet he felt uneasy.
    “What is it, Jaime?” Sozansky asked. “You’re getting on my nerves. Something wrong?”
    Vasquez looked up, and slowly shook his head. “Not that I can see.” He’d been born in the slums of San Juan, Puerto Rico. His mother had died giving birth to him and he’d never known his father. If it hadn’t been for the strong hand of his grandmother, he would have turned out to be just another street kid. But she had made him finish school, and she had made him join the U.S. Merchant Marine, where after two years as an ordinary seaman he was offered a berth at the Merchant Marine Academy in Kings Point, New York, because he was bright and dedicated, and the service needed men of his caliber.
    He’d graduated number three in his class, and since then his promotions had been very rapid. His superiors said that he was an officer with good instincts.
    “If you’re going to act like our new captain and prowl around in the middle of the night when you get your own ship, you’re going to give your crew the crazies.”
    “He was up here?” Vasquez asked.
    “Twice.”
    “What did he want?”
    “The same thing as you,” Sozansky said. “Do me a favor, Jaime, go back to bed, let the computer run the ship, and let me do the babysitting.”
    “Did he say anything?”
    Sozansky laughed. “Not a word. Not one bloody word.”
    Something about the captain wasn’t adding up in Vasquez’s mind, but for the life of him he couldn’t figure what it might be. He’d worked under a lot of sour, even angry masters before; men who were mad at the world. And they had the same smell about them, the same look. But with Slavin it was somehow different. Maybe because he was a Russian.
    “I’m going to bed.”
    “Oh, the last time he was here he took the watch schedule with him,” Sozansky said. “I thought you might want to know.”
    “I gave him a copy this afternoon.”
    Sozansky shrugged. “Maybe he’s going to change it. Captain’s prerogative.”
    “Yeah,” Vasquez said. He left the bridge and went down one deck to officers’ territory. Just at his cabin door, he hesitated for a moment. If their new captain was prowling the ship, maybe he was looking for something; maybe the man’s instincts were telling him that something was wrong.
    No one was out and about at this hour of the morning. The bridge was manned and the engine room would have someone on duty to watch over the machinery, and he supposed the cook and his assistant might be stirring by now, prepping for breakfast. But most of the crew and officers were in bed, asleep, as he should be.
    He let himself into his cabin, careful to make as little noise as possible, so as not to wake up his girlfriend, Alicia Mora. She was one of the stewards, and she’d have to get up in a couple of hours to help set up the officers’ wardroom for breakfast.
    None of them had gotten much sleep in the past few days, trying to make the ship as presentable as possible for their new master. Last night when she’d come to him, she’d been tired and a little cranky. After they’d had a couple of glasses of wine and made love, she’d fallen asleep and had not awoken when Vasquez got out of bed, got dressed, and went up to the bridge.
    “Jaime,” she called softly.
    “Go back to sleep,” Vasquez said. He got undressed, hanging his clothes over his desk chair.
    “What time is it?” Alicia asked sleepily. “Is something wrong?”
    “Nothing’s wrong,” he told her. “Now, go back to sleep, you’ve got a couple hours.”
    The bedside light came on. Alicia was sitting up in bed, her short dark hair standing on end in spikes. The covers had fallen away exposing her tiny, milk-white breasts. “British girls don’t get tans,” she’d explained to him. “We just burn and peel.”
    “Something’s