Wood's Harbor by Steven Becker Page A

went to an empty seat, his coffee spilling as he sat. 
    “Good afternoon, Sheriff,” the doctor said.
    The sheriff looked at his watch. “Still morning by my clock.”
    The others suppressed giggles as the sheriff missed the barb. 
    The man stopped reading and looked up. “OK. The first decision maker was her dad, now deceased. The next is Mac Travis, currently missing by the last reports I heard. I’m not sure how long until he is assumed dead.”
    All eyes turned to the sheriff.
    He cleared his throat. “Ms. Woodson and the Cuban fellow were rescued. We haven’t found any sign of Travis, although we’d surely like to beat the feds - dead or alive, makes no difference to me.” His radio squelched causing several in the group to jump. “Y’all got any food at these meetings,” he asked after turning his radio off, dismissing the call.
    The head man ignored him. “After Travis, the executor of the will is Bradley Davies.”
    “That old boy’s shacked up in some country club prison in Virginia.” The sheriff said.
    A new voice chimed in, “Is there any precedence in a convict making medical decisions?”
    The room was quiet for a minute. “Yes,” the administrator said. “If that’s all we have, I suggest we contact him.”
    The leader closed the file and turned to the man who had handed him the paper. “OK, you contact Davies.” He turned to the sheriff, his look clearly contemptuous, “And you find Travis. We will meet again after the insurance rep gets here.”
     
    ***
     
    Mac moved the anchor line to the bow cleat, fighting as the boat spun against the strong current until it was tied off. The tidal force sounded like a river as it moved against the stationary hull, but they were secure. They were less mobile to pursue the CIA man with the hook set, but the current in the narrow cut forced his hand. Under power, they would burn precious fuel, fighting the current to remain in the center of the cut. He looked over at Trufante’s prone body laid out on the deck, asleep. 
    Might as well let him get some rest, Mac thought. 
    He had no idea how long the watch would last, or if the man would even come back this way, but it was the only card he had left. 
    He thought about Mel in the hospital and hoped she was all right, but as much as he wanted to be there, he knew there was nothing he could do until he cleared himself. The only thing he had left was his name, and right now it was as mucky as the bottom underneath the boat. He looked up as several fish jumped pursuing a school of baitfish past the boat. It had been a half hour since they had freed the boat and several boats had passed at a distance, including some bigger charter boats probably heading for Fort Jefferson in the Dry Tortugas. He wondered where Norm could have gone - and why. The rental boat didn’t have the range to get to the Tortugas and back. The only thing that made sense was some kind of clandestine meeting, and he thought the Marquesas Keys would be the likely place for that. 
    His head bobbed as sleep tried to take him, but the wake of a passing boat snapped his neck erect. This was starting to feel pointless, sitting here. If the man chose to return even a mile further offshore, he would be invisible without binoculars. Maybe heading back to Key West and scouring the bars would be more productive. Either way, finding the man was going to be like catching a single minnow in the ocean. He started the engines and went to the bow to release the anchor. Trufante stirred and he thought about waking him on the way back to the helm, but he remembered his promise to let him sleep. 
    Hand over hand, he pulled the boat closer to the anchor until the line was perpendicular and the hull was right over it. With a quick jerk he yanked the hook from the bottom and brought it aboard, careful to dip it several times to clear the muck from the flukes and chain. Once secured, he moved back to the helm where he corrected the drift and steered