Free Venom: A Thriller in Paradise (The Thriller in Paradise Series Book 3) by Rob Swigart Page A

to his chintzy hotel, chauffeur him around the island at night. “I don’t know,” she said, voice carefully neutral after all. Then she turned and smiled at him. “Maybe they needed a vacation? Or maybe the ship was running low on fuel. It’s a long trip from down there to Vancouver.”
    “She had extra tanks,” Vincent said thoughtfully. “There was no word of trouble on board. Hell, she has all the latest navigation equipment, Satnav, that sort of thing. We’re a professional organization, Carrie. A professional, militant…” He stopped. He had her attention and some of the old rhetorical flare crept into his voice. She waited for him to go on, for the end.
    But he said nothing. His eyes grew hooded, distant, lost in shadows, and suddenly he was a fat old fool again, a major pain in the ass.
    “Perhaps the meeting…?” she suggested, turning the key.
    Vincent waved his hand for her to drive on. As she shifted into gear, she noticed for the first time the medical bracelet he wore, the thin red caduceus on silver. She wondered briefly what it was for. Heart? Diabetes? Hemophilia?
    The harbor opened up before them, a narrow inlet with steep hills on the other side. A cruise ship was docked.
    She drove past it to the Coast Guard station. There were four cars parked beside the building: an ancient white VW van, two white government vehicles, and a police car. Vincent frowned as he heaved himself out of the tiny car. This was going to be difficult.
    The first stars appeared overhead, small white spots against the velvety lavender. A dank smell arose from the harbor water— the exhalations of disease, not the salty tang of the changing tide.
    “Where’s this road go?” he asked as she locked the car.
    Carrie looked up. “There are some fish ponds up there, real old. They’re supposed to be from before the Hawaiians came here from Tahiti or wherever, made by these mysterious little people called
menehune
.”
    “Great. Little people.”
    The door opened, throwing a yellow trapezoid of light onto the gravel, and Cobb Takamura appeared, adding the distorted shape of his shadow to the light.
    “Mr. Meissner?” he said.
    Vincent paused a moment beside the car, then stepped forward aggressively. “Yes. I just got in. What the hell is going on?”
    Cobb smiled, an expression almost lost in the shade except for the hint of his teeth that showed. “A very good question, Mr. Meissner. Sergeant Hirogawa told me you might be coming.”
    The meeting went badly from the start. Vincent saw he had gotten off on the wrong track, but was unable to change course. Commander Shafton was a militaristic popinjay with a chip on his shoulder, and the Japanese policeman was as bland as the airline food. The biologist had said nothing, merely looked out from beneath shaggy graying eyebrows at him, as if he were a microscope slide. The other Coast Guard officer looked bored and made no pretense otherwise. The conversation kept slipping away.
    He did learn the ship had been full of dead bodies, and that one of the bodies had come back to life: Tracy Ann was not dead. But then, it could not be said that she was alive, exactly. She had respiration. She had a heartbeat, after a fashion. That was all.
    “Your vessel entered United States waters,” Commander Shafton said, for at least the third time. “Without permission, without notification, without passing through customs. The Coast Guard is responsible for patrolling and protecting these waters. Your ship is a derelict, and we don’t know where it’s been.”
    Vincent did not answer. If the fool did not know why
Ocean Mother
was in Tahiti and what she had done there, Vincent Meissner was not about to enlighten him. It had made international headlines; this bozo must have his head buried in a dark place. “No need to go over this ground again, Commander,” Vincent said with an air of such feigned understanding that his impatience waved its hand for recognition in the background.