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“Jo, stay calm.  Sshh…stop crying.  Sshh…”

Nick patted her on the arm and tried to soothe her.  The noise was getting louder and louder and was bound to attract a crowd soon.

Jordana continued crying, releasing torrents of emotion and tension.

“Jordana, stop!” said Nick, firmly.  “Pete might come back.  We’ve got to get you below before he does.”

Nick’s reasonable words worked.  Jordana’s sobs turned into hiccupping snuffles.  Nick picked up his charts and guidebook and looked out over the harbor.  He could see the Sunset Voyager.  He could see a shadow moving in the cabin.

“Go!” said Nick, in a loud whisper.  “Now!”

Jordana eased her way to the ladder and scrambled down.  She crawled across the back deck and slid down the stairs to the living area.  She crept up the hall to the guest bedroom and slid the door open.  She sat in the doorway, waiting for Nick.

Nick stood on guard for another five minutes.  He didn’t see any more movement on the Sunset Voyager, although the cabin lights stayed on.  Finally, Nick tucked the charts under his arm and descended to the lower deck.  He fiddled with the chairs and the cushions on the bench.  He hummed his ‘I’m Cool’ theme under his breath.  In his head, he added lyrics.

“Look at me, I’m cool.  I’m just checking out the boat, being all responsible-like, so if anybody’s spying on me, I’m cool.  Here I go now, down below now, I’m cool.”

This time, when Nick went below, he pulled the hatchway cover from its hidden slot.  Then he closed the door and bolted both in place.  He turned to see Jo watching him, huddled on the floor outside the guest bedroom doorway.

“There!  It’s locked, Jo.  No one can get in.  You’re safe.”

Jo nodded her appreciation.  Nick set the charts and the guidebook on the table.

“Although I’m not sure that you need to be,” said Nick, “locked in, I mean.  I’m still not convinced that…you know…that Pete’s the bad guy you say he is…”

“He’s a murderer,” exclaimed Jo.  “He killed Mickey…and maybe someone else too.”

Oh, fuck, thought Nick.  Now she’s added another victim!?  Every time I talk to her, the body count goes up.

Suddenly, the shrill sound of a phone ringing split the air.  Nick looked around and reached for his cell phone which lay on the kitchen counter.

“Don’t answer it!” cried Jo.

Nick’s hand froze over the phone.  “Why not?” he asked.

“Because it’s Pete,” said Jo, in a whisper.  “I used your phone to call him.”

Nick couldn’t believe what he was hearing.  “You did what?” 

“I couldn’t think what else to do to throw him off the track,” whined Jordana.

Suddenly, the shrill ringing ceased.  The echo ricocheted around the cabin and their ears for a moment and then stopped.  Nick picked up the phone and pushed a button.  He recited a number to Jo.

She nodded.  “Yes, that’s Pete’s number.  He was calling back to check on me, I guess and…oh, no…oh, shit…oh, no…”

Nick thought if Jo’s eyes got any bigger, they’d explode out of her head.  “What?”

“Voice mail,” she said, and tears started at the corners of her eyes.  “He’ll have heard your voice mail message.  He’ll know it’s your phone.  He’ll know I’m here.”  Jo’s eyes darted around the cabin, and she pulled herself into an even tighter ball.

“Calm down,” said Nick.  “It’s okay.  I don’t put my voice on there.”  He looked around the cabin and then back at Jo.  “Because of the fans.  I use the message that came with the phone.

Nick took a deep breath and then exhaled softly.  He reset the phone to vibrate and put it back on the counter.  “I’m having a beer,” he said.  “Want one?”

Jordana shook her head.  Nick opened the fridge and pulled out a beer and a bottle of water.  He twisted the top off the beer and rolled the bottle of water up the hallway.

Jordana grabbed it and opened it.  “Thanks,” she said and then after a moment, “…for everything.”

“Oh, don’t be thanking me yet, Miss Jo,” said Nick.  “You have a lot of explaining to do.  The only reason that I have you locked in here now is because I believe that you believe that you are in danger. I don’t necessarily agree with you on that.  Do you get that?”

“Yes, Nick, yes, I do, and I’m grateful…”

“Well, don’t be too grateful too soon.  I could be putting myself at risk here, and I don’t like the idea of that at all.  You haven’t exactly come across as the sanest person on the planet, and I’m not anxious to do something that will end up making me look like either a criminal or a fool!”

“I’m not crazy, Nick,” said Jo, quietly.  “You only think that because Pete made you believe it, not from anything I’ve done.

“Maybe so,” countered Nick, “but all that does is make me more gullible, more of an idiot in the eyes of the world if this turns out to be some big practical joke or publicity stunt.”

“It’s no joke,” insisted Jo.

“Okay, you are going to get to explain it all.  Now, take off your clothes.”

“What?”  Jo instinctively crossed her arms over her chest.

Nick laughed.  “I didn’t mean it that way.”

He stood up and walked down the hallway to his bedroom.  Jordana shrank back against the wall as he moved by her.  He returned a few seconds later holding a t-shirt.

“Put this on,” he said.  “It’s okay, it’s clean.”  He pointed into the bedroom.  “Go in there and take off your clothes and put this on.”

“Why?”

“One, because you need pajamas and two, because I want to check your clothes for bugs.”

Nick laughed again at the look on her face.  “Recording devices, not insects,” he explained.

Jordana disappeared into the bedroom, sliding the door shut.  Nick went back to the living room and sat on the sofa.  He took a long pull from his beer and leaned his head back, closing his eyes and reflecting on his latest crazy idea.

It was while he was walking about with Pete that Nick had the thought that maybe this whole thing was about him.  He didn’t really believe that, but these days, anything was possible.  The whole world was taping itself and its neighbors, trying to get its fifteen minutes of televised fame.  Nick did not want to be part of anyone’s ‘reality show’.  His own reality was often difficult enough to bear.

Nick couldn’t see how it was possible, that Pete and Jo were part of some crazy scheme involving him. And even so, what material would they have been able to collect?  They’d spent a very short amount of time together, so what would there be…a couple of dinner conversations…a lunch…Pete’s dissertation on Jo’s illness.  Even if they did have lots of coverage of each other plotting and strategizing, they didn’t have much of Nick.

Unless they had his boat wired.

Nick was pretty sure that wasn’t possible.  He’d had the boat pretty thoroughly checked out.  He hadn’t specifically said what to check for, but he knew the guy had checked the electrical system, so…

Nick shook his head and told himself to stop these thoughts before he became as paranoid as Jo.  Still, he was glad he hadn’t felt the need to jerk off since he’d been on the Lenore.

Looked at reasonably, the whole idea was pretty far-fetched, thought Nick.  But was it any more out there than Pete as attempted murderer, no wait, make that murderer, no, hold on, now he’s a serial killer?!

“Here ya go,” said Jo.

She stood in the doorway of the guest room, holding a pile of clothes.  She had turned off the light in the room.

“Set them on the floor,” said Nick.

Jo set the clothes down in a neat pile beside the doorway.  Nick didn’t move toward them.  He suddenly felt foolish for having asked for them.  He reached up and turned off the light.

The bright light of the boat interior disappeared, leaving them in total darkness until their eyes adjusted to the light filtering in through the small windows in the living area and the bedroom at the other end of the boat.  The marina security lights were bright, but Nick’s boat wasn’t directly under one, and the light that came in made it possible to see shades of dark and light rather than color.

Jo remained frozen in the shadowy hallway.  Nick could make out her silhouette.

“You can come out and sit down, Jo,” said Nick.  “No one can see you.”

Jordana hesitated and then slowly moved forward.  When she reached the doorway to the living room, she crouched down and scuttled across to where Nick was sitting.  She hunkered down and squeezed herself against the back of the sofa.

“So what do we do now?” she asked in a quiet voice.

“I don’t know,” replied Nick, honestly.  “I guess maybe we should compare stories.”

“Okay,” said Jordana, “what do you do for a living?”

Nick looked at her, arching one eyebrow elegantly.  He saw a ghost of a smile cross her lips.  She sighed and relaxed visibly.

“Tell me about Jordana Miles,” said Nick, softly.

Jo started talking, very quietly.  At times, Nick had to strain to hear her.  It was almost as if she were talking to herself.

“There’s not much to tell,” she began and gave her vital statistics – age, height, date and place of birth. 

But not weight, Nick noticed.

Jo described her childhood as happy, her high school days as bearable and her college days as the best five years of her life.

“Why?” asked Nick.

“Because I found out who I was,” replied Jo, without hesitating.  “See, before I went to college, I was only a reflection of everyone around me.  I was my parents’ daughter, I was Mickey’s friend, I was so-and-so’s classmate… But I didn’t know who I was in relation to myself.  When I went away to school, I was on my own.  I didn’t know a single person at school.  I could present myself however I liked.  It made me think hard about how I wanted to do that.”

Nick nodded.  He guessed he understood what she was saying.  He’d never really had the opportunity to decide that for himself.  He’d been packaged and presented as part of the group… Nick…little Nicky…the blond one…the innocent one…  It had been very hard to change that image as he grew up.  He wondered what he would do if he were given such a chance – to present himself to strangers as the person he wanted to be.

“Did you do it the way you wanted?” asked Nick.

“Pretty much,” answered Jo.  “There were a few bumps in the road, of course, but that wasn’t unexpected.”

“Bumps like the ‘frosh fifteen’?” queried Nick.

“What’s that?” asked Jo.

Nick peered at her in the dim light.  “It’s…uh…you know…the weight you put on during your first year away from home.  Isn’t that what they call it?”

Jo shrugged.  “I know what you’re talking about, but I’ve never heard it called that.  And no, that wasn’t one of the bumps.  I have a great metabolism.  I can eat anything and not gain weight.  It used to piss Mickey off something fierce when we were in high school.  She was always on a diet.”

Jo laughed and then stopped abruptly.  “Tell me what he said about me,” she pleaded softly.

Nick recounted the story Pete had told him.  Jo sat with her lips pinched together until he finished.

“So that story isn’t true?” asked Nick.

“No, that story is true,” replied Jordana.  She held up a hand to stop Nick’s protest.  “But,” she continued, “that’s not my story.  That’s Angela’s story.”

“Who’s Angela?” asked Nick.

“She’s Mickey’s cousin,” answered Jo.  “My God, he’s diabolical.  Not much wonder he made you believe the story!  It’s all true…just the way he told it.  But it’s about a different person.”

Nick shook his head.  “But why?  Why would he tell me that?”  He yawned halfway through the question.

“I think I know,” said Jo, “but with this new information…”  This time it was Jordana who yawned.  “I think we can make better sense of this in the morning, Nick.  The daylight might make it all seem more reasonable.”

Nick wasn’t sure if anything that had been said or done in the last couple of days could be made to seem reasonable, but he knew that she was right.  Things looked different in the daylight.

“Okay,” he said.  “You sleep in the guest room on the lower bed.  You’re on the water side of the boat, and no one could see you even if they did look in the window.”  Nick tried to use a calm, reassuring voice. 

Jo moved quickly from the sofa to the doorway of the bedroom.  Nick patted her on the arm and walked to his room.

“There’s towels and shit like that in your closet,” he said over his shoulder.

Jordana nodded.  “Okay, Nick, thanks.  And I’m sorry…I’m sorry I’ve put you to all this trouble, but I didn’t know who to turn to or where to go.  I just thought this might be the safest place to hide.

Nick stopped and turned back to her.  “You’re kidding, right?”

“What do you mean?”

She looked sincere, Nick saw, and pushed down the thought that had bubbled up in his brain – that it was all a setup, and he’d be appearing in an upcoming episode of America’s Stupidest Rockstars.

“Nothing,” he said.  “It was nothing.  We’ll talk in the morning.  We’ll work it out then.  Goodnight, Jo.”

“Goodnight, Nick.”

Nick went into his bedroom and peeled off his clothes.  He hesitated when he got to his boxers.  He usually slept in the nude but…no, who the hell knew what might happen tonight…and whatever it was, he wanted to have pants on for it.

Nick crawled into bed.  He snuggled down under the duvet .  He hoped he’d fall asleep quickly and have a dreamless night.  Reality was fucked up enough, he didn’t need nightmares as well.

The safest place to hide.

Nick smiled into the darkness.  That was weird, Jo having said that.  Maybe that’s what he should rename the boat.

Safest Place to Hide.

Nick sighed.  Maybe by the end of tomorrow, he’d know if that was a true name for the Lenore or not. 

Nick barely heard Jo flush the toilet and a few seconds later, when she slid the door to her room shut, he was already asleep.