Just Add Trouble Read online

  “Nah, Mad Dog. The first group just startled her ‘cause she was doing about three miles an hour when we overtook her, and she didn’t hear us coming up behind her.”

  Mad Dog?

  “What’s she doing out here by herself?”

  “Hel-lo,” I said with a wave, “the she of whom you are talking is right hee-er.”

  White teeth gleamed in a dusty, whiskery face. “Okay, then,” he drawled, “what are you doing here by yourself? And why so slow? Mechanical problems?”

  I wasn’t about to admit I was creeping along because I was scared to drive faster. “No, my rig’s running just fine, thank you. I’m just not in a big hurry, unlike others I could mention. And I’m alone because my boyfriend pissed me off, so I offed the bastard, buried his body back there in the desert and stole his fancy yeller truck.”

  There was an ominous silence until Mad Dog guffawed, gave me a thumbs up, and was joined in laughter by his buddies. I relaxed. Most times, if people plan to slit one’s throat, they don’t take such delight in one’s small witticisms.

  Mad Dog—no doubt named that by his mama—dismounted his dirty bike and leaned against my dirtier Toyota. “Where you headed?”

  “Paris.”

  “Before that.”

  “Uh, Loreto?” No use telling this guy I wanted to get to Santa Rosalia as fast as my stolen vehicle could take me.

  “Did, by any chance, your old man show you anything resembling a map before you offed him?”

  “Huh?”

  “Map? You know, a piece of paper that shows those who know how to read one how to get from point A to point B?”

  This guy was growing on me. Sarcasm and tight leather’ll do that to a girl. “I know where I’m going,” I insisted, even though I didn’t.

  “Yeah, but do you know how to get there?”

  “Duh, I follow the road.”

  “No, Honey, you follow us. If you want to get to Loreto before dark, that is. At the rate you’re movin’ you’ll be out here all day and night.”

  Dark? Dark? The idea of spending another night alone on what served as a road sent a shiver up my spine. What was I thinking, running off into the desert without Chino and Jan? I could end up as coyote food and no one would ever know where to look for me. The enormity of my situation suddenly hit me. I had a bag of chicharones, one burrito, and a gallon of water left, no weapons. Munching on pork skins without a beer to wash them down, crammed into the Toyota with no way to defend myself against dangerous critters, suddenly seemed like a really bad idea.

  My answer came out whiney. “I can’t keep up with you guys.”

  “Sure you can. This rig was made for off-road. If we can do it on dirt bikes, you can definitely keep pace in such a fine vehicle. That is, if you know how to drive it. You do, don’t you?” he challenged.

  “Of course, I do. Get on that puny little bike of yours and lead the way, big boy.”

  Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall. Proverbs 16:18.

  Chapter 22

  Two hours, and what felt like several broken ribs and a need for an emergency kidney transplant later, we roared out of the desert, onto the blessed pavement of Baja 1. Evidently Mad Dog never heard of such things as death, or dire bodily injury.

  Five minutes after we hit the pavement, the entire gang, who moved like a flock of birds as a unit, swooped to a dusty halt in front of a truck stop. I followed. We all looked like photos I’d seen of mud men in New Guinea.

  Crawling from the driver’s seat, I made the mistake of shaking my head. Dirt rained like red flour all around me. Two little kids came out of the truck stop café to ogle and giggle. I was bent over, knocking more debris from my hair when I sensed someone standing behind me. Very, very close behind me. I whirled up, ready to do battle, and found myself face-to-face with Mad Dog.

  “Here,” he said, handing me a gallon water jug. “Try this.” From the looks of his relatively clean, damp, face and hair, it had worked for him.

  “Thanks.” Leaning my head back, I let the heavenly, if chilly, water roll down my face and over my hair. Shaking like a dog, I opened my eyes. Mad Dog was grinning.

  “You have red hair.”

  “It was this morning.”

  “I like redheads. Especially those with balls. Since you offed your old man this morning, buried him in the desert, I guess that makes you, like, available?”

  “I guess that makes you, like, wrong?”

  “Too bad. Oh, well, since you put it that way, can I share a small secret with you?”

  There’s something about a man in leather, especially one with beautiful white teeth, green eyes and coal black hair. “Please do.”

  He reached over and gently tugged my chin, turning my head back towards where we’d just come from. “That,” he purred, “is the way to Loreto.”

  I jerked my head away. “I knew that. I was just following you until we…uh, got to this truck stop.”

  “Sure you were. Wanna beer before you head back?”

  “I thought you had to rush off to San Ignacio.”

  He leaned forward and whispered in my ear. “I could be detoured.”

  My ears and whiskers, was this guy sexy or what? A little devil whispered in my other ear, “Who will ever know if you have an unscheduled tryst in the desert? Invite this beautiful man back to your boat. A hot shower, a drop of champagne, and…whack! The devilish voice was gone and another, annoying one, yelled, “Hetta, get a grip! J-e-n-k-s!”

  How I hate the voice of reason. It never lets me have any fun.

  I bought the whole gang a beer and we went our separate ways. Mad Dog, whose real name turned out to be Russ Madden, gave me his card before riding out of my life. A dentist; who knew? Maybe I’d go in for a cleaning.

  I drove a couple of miles south, contemplating what had just happened. Old habits die hard, it would seem. I had been with Jenks in a m-m-m-m-monogamous—there, I said it—relationship for months. What was I thinking back there? That Jenks was always gone? That I was eating more meals alone now than when I was celibate? That this long distance romance was getting a lit-tle old?

  I shook off my little pity party and headed for Santa Rosalia, but to give my entourage, and the dentist, a considerable head start, I dropped in on Geary at Burro Beach, had a snack at Bertha’s Restaurant next door, stopped in Mulege for a few provisions, and made my way toward home, sweet boat.

  Rolling into Santa Rosalia late in the afternoon, I parked the flashy yellow Toyota on a back street, left the keys in the ignition, and managed to wearily trudge the three long blocks to the marina. With any luck, by this time tomorrow, Nacho’s pride and joy would be in a chop shop, and I’d be back in my slip on the other side of the sea.

  As I entered the Santa Rosalia Marina’s gate, I saw a group of yachties sitting around on the dock, having cocktails as they did every afternoon. And some mornings. There was no way to sneak past them, so I plopped into a plastic Pacifico Beer chair.

  “Hey, there, Hetta, welcome back. We knew you were on your way.”

  “How did you—”

  “Oh Boy! Oberto!”

  “He flew in about noon,” Smith told me. “I let him in his cage, gave him fresh water and some jerky. Poor little bugger was worn out.”

  “That makes two of us.”

  “Want me to get your stuff out of my truck?”

  Oh, crap. “Ya know, Smith, I think I’ll just take a shower and crash. Let’s deal with the truck tomorrow, okay?”

  “Okay by me. I have to hustle, myself. I’m getting ready to cross over, you know. Tomorrow I have to find a place over here to leave my truck until I get back.”

  How about la llanteria in Loreto? “I may have some ideas on that. Later.”

  “Later.”

  I headed for my fridge and an ice cold Tecate. Trouble latched onto my shoulder and began gnawing on my hair the minute I sank down onto the settee. I was bone weary, but elated to be back home safe and sound. �
�Ya know, Trouble, if you’da given me a ride, I’d be more inclined to forgive you. What part of, ‘you cannot live with me’ is it that you do not understand?”

  He made cooing noise and nibbled my cheek. “Flatterer.” I gave him a sip of beer, then pushed myself up and to the sat phone.

  Jan picked up on the first ring. “Hetta?”

  “That would be me.”

  “Thank God. Where are you?”

  “On the boat, tucked in safely for the night.”

  “Where did you leave, uh, the, uh…evidence.”

  “On a back street in Santa Rosalia, keys in ignition.”

  “Good. Hetta?”

  “Yes, Jan.”

  “I have some bad news for you.”

  “Oh, really?” I gave Trouble a neck scratch. “What would that be?”

  “Well, I’ve sorta misplaced Trouble.”

  “Misplaced?” I was annoyed enough to let her squirm a mite.

  “You know that old cage we put him in at Chino’s cousin’s house? Trouble picked the lock and is gone. I’m really, really sorry.”

  She sounded so pitiful I decided to let her off the hook.

  “He’s here.”

  “What?”

  “They always say bad news travels fast, and the little bugger beat me back to the boat by hours. I don’t suppose you want to come over and pick him up?”

  Silence.

  “That’s what I thought. Oh, well, I’ll just take him back across to Sonora with me and try to figure out what to do with him when I have to head up to Oakland. Maybe the port captain will birdsit. At any rate, I’m too tired to worry about it right now.”

  “Did you tell Smith about his truck?”

  “Not yet. I’ll take the bus to Loreto tomorrow, pick up Smith’s truck, and as soon as I get back here, I’ll leave for Sonora.”

  “At night?”

  “Probably not. I’ll wait until dawn. That way I’ll be back in my slip for Happy Hour.”

  “Hetta, I really don’t like the idea of you crossing alone. I know it’s only a little over eighty miles, but it is a sea.”

  “Oh, come on, I’ll be fine. Hell, I’ll be within radio contact of both sides all the way over. If something goes wrong, I’ll just yell for help.”

  “How about weather?”

  “Smith says we have a decent weather window good for the next few days, but I’ll listen to the early ham nets. If there’s a problem, I won’t go.”

  “Promise?”

  “Promise.”

  “Well, okay then. I guess I’ll turn in now. Chino’s already sawing logs.”

  “Did you remember to burp him?”

  “Bitch.”

  Chapter 23

  “Ahoy, Raymond Johnson. You up, Hetta?”

  I took a sip of coffee and yelled for Smith and Maggie to come on in. I had the Sonrisa Net on, getting the dope on the weather in the sea for the next day’s crossing.

  “Hetta!”

  “Shush, Smith, I wanna hear this.”

  “But, Hetta, my truck. Someone stole it!”

  “Hush. No they didn’t. I know where it is. Get some coffee and settle down.”

  Smith slunk to the galley and came back with a steaming mug of coffee and a pouty look on his normally cheerful face. I listened to the weather guessers long enough to satisfy myself that leaving at oh-dark-thirty the next morning would be a good idea. Santa Ana’s were predicted in California soon, so I had to scoot before a norther blew in and trapped me in the harbor for several days. As soon as I turned off the ham radio, Smith jumped to his feet, dumping poor Maggie onto the carpet.

  “My truck?”

  “Long story. I’m going down to Loreto to retrieve it this morning. The bad news is that we had a little mishap. The good news is that you’re gonna have a brand new axel and two new tires.”

  “You broke my axel?”

  “Not me, exactly. A pesky tope did. But not to worry. All fixed.”

  “I’m going with you.”

  “As you wish. Do you know what time the first bus heads that way.”

  “They run all day, starting a ten. But that's a little late for me.”

  “Well, fooey. I wanted to get down there, pick up your pickup and be back here fairly early. I plan to leave at first light tomorrow morning.”

  “Really? Me, too. We can buddy boat.”

  Oh, great. The last thing I wanted was to cross at a snail’s pace with his tiny single engine Taiwanese-made boat, which he quite appropriately dubbed Taiwan On.

  “You know, there isn’t gonna be any wind tomorrow and you are a sailor.”

  “Not tomorrow. I plan to motor.”

  “How fast can you motor?”

  “Four, five knots.”

  “I’ll do ten, twelve.”

  “Oh. Okay, I’ll leave tonight, you can cover my back.”

  Sigh. “Fine. Let’s go get your truck.”

  “How are we gonna get there? Hitchhike?”

  “With a little luck, I think I can find us some wheels.”

  Old Yeller was right where I left her, doors unlocked, keys in the ignition. Are there no self-respecting car thieves left in Mexico? Have they all moved to the States?

  “Hop in.”

  Smith hesitated. “You sure?”

  “Absolutely.” I fired up the Toyota and we were in Loreto in record time. I have to say, though, traveling Baja One in broad daylight in a stolen, bright yellow off-roader that belongs to a murderous drug dealer gave me a moment or two of worry, but what the hell? Beats the bus.

  Not wishing to push my heretofore good luck, though, we dumped Nacho’s rig in downtown Loreto. Just for fun I turned on the GPS before locking the keys inside. Maybe Nacho would be able to track down his truck and be so grateful that he wouldn’t try to hunt me down and off me in some very unpleasant fashion.

  Much to my relief, and Smith’s, his old pickup was still at the llanteria in Loreto, and all fixed up, ready to roll. Seventy bucks later, we were driving north.

  Finally, something was going my way.

  To keep it that way, I decided I’d notify Budget of the demise of their Neon only after I was far from the long arm of the Loreto law.

  By the time we dropped off Smith’s pickup with the family he’d found to store it with, it was getting dark.

  As we walked back down the dock, we heard laughter from the boats, and the sounds of their owners making dinner, playing cards, watching movies and all the regular stuff cruisers do before turning in at Baja midnight, which is about eight-thirty.

  “Smith, you must be as exhausted as I am. Maybe you shouldn’t cross tonight. I can wait another day, I guess.”

  “I’ll be all right. I got all the way down here from California alone. Once I clear the harbor and get a few miles out, I’ll set the autopilot and my radar alarm. To be on the safe side, I have my alarm clock set to go off every hour so I can check things out for myself. I stay in the cockpit, not below, and as you know, there’s almost no traffic between here and the other side, once I clear Tortuga Island.”

  “Every hour, huh? Let’s see, if your deck is three feet from the surface and you are over six feet tall, let’s say your eye level is nine feet from sea level. You are traveling four knots—”

  “Sometimes five,” he corrected proudly.

  “Bear with me. Let’s use four. Anyhow, from nine feet, you can see about three and a half miles. Do the math. Once an hour ain’t so good, especially if, like you say, you sometimes average five knots. Hell, at only four knots an hour, you’d run over someone in fifty-two or so minutes.”

  Smith’s mouth had dropped open somewhere in the middle of my little calculation session. “Jeez, Hetta, what are you, some kind of brain?”

  I hadn’t heard that term used in a very long time. I laughed. “Nope, I just have a good memory for formulas. One point seventeen times the square root of your eye height equals the distance to the horizon in nautical miles. So three times one point one seven e
quals three point five one miles. I could be a little off, depending on you deck height, but I’d rethink that alarm clock timing if I were you.”

  “Like I said, I got down here.” He sounded pretty defensive, which is the reaction I get from most men, right before they start avoiding me. Only Jenks appreciates stuff like this, but I think that’s because he can figure circles around me, could have had that calculation down to the last decimal point before I started. Oh, and he doesn’t feel threatened by a woman who actually knows what six inches is.

  “But like you said,” I said in an attempt to pat down Smith’s ruffled ego, “you do it all the time. It’s just that the idea of some guy underway, asleep, at night, and on autopilot, isn’t all that reassuring for the rest of us.”

  “You powerboaters worry too much. If I get really tired, I just heave to, put on my strobe light, go to bed and drift.”

  “We’ve done something similar. Kill the engines, turn on the strobe and drift. Even then, though, we have someone on watch. Are you banking some shrimper’s gonna post a watch?”

  “So we do a little bump in the night.”

  “It’s you boat,” I said, parroting a former boat captain of mine. “What radio channel will you be on?”

  “I’ll monitor sixteen and seventy-two. I’m all set to leave, wanna help me with my lines?”

  He started Taiwan On’s engine, and several other boaters sauntered over to help him on his way. As I watched him pull out of the harbor, it made me feel pretty wimpy that I was worried about crossing a little patch of sea by myself in broad daylight.

  Trouble, who had been perched on my shoulder since we left the pickup, flew ahead of me as I headed for Raymond Johnson. I followed, but another boater came out on the dock.

  “Hey, Hetta, what time you leaving?”

  “Four, four-thirty.”

  “Need me to help with the lines?”

  “Naw, I’ll be fine. I just hope I don’t wake everyone up.”

  “Well, if you—”

  A raucous squawk and a scream cut the night air. I ran for the boat, only to find a man face down on my deck, with Trouble sitting on his back. Every time the man moved, Trouble bit his ear.