Red Below Deck: A Mystery Thriller Read online

  Red Below Deck

  A Mystery Thriller

  Ramona Light

  Red Below Deck

  © 2022 by Ramona Light

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including information storage and retrieval systems, without express written permission by the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, incidents, and places are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. None of the characters in the book are based on actual persons. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is entirely and unintentionally coincidental.

  Contents

  1. Chapter 1

  2. Chapter 2

  3. Chapter 3

  4. Chapter 4

  5. Chapter 5

  6. Chapter 6

  7. Chapter 7

  8. Chapter 8

  9. Chapter 9

  10. Chapter 10

  11. Chapter 11

  12. Chapter 12

  13. Chapter 13

  14. Chapter 14

  15. Chapter 15

  16. Chapter 16

  17. Chapter 17

  18. Chapter 18

  19. Chapter 19

  20. Chapter 20

  21. Chapter 21

  22. Chapter 22

  23. Chapter 23

  24. Chapter 24

  25. Chapter 25

  26. Chapter 26

  27. Chapter 27

  28. Chapter 28

  29. Chapter 29

  30. Chapter 30

  31. Chapter 31

  32. Chapter 32

  33. Chapter 33

  34. Chapter 34

  35. Chapter 35

  36. Chapter 36

  37. Chapter 37

  38. Chapter 38

  39. Chapter 39

  Epilogue

  Also By Ramona Light

  Chapter 1

  “Hang on, Kay. You’re telling me they found the kid in a pile of corpses?” Lina asked.

  I let out a sigh and glanced over at my partner sitting in the passenger seat next to me. We’d hit the road over seven hours ago, and she’d been avoiding the subject of our assignment the entire time. Now I knew why.

  “I thought you said you read the case file this time,” I said.

  She crossed her arms and turned to look out the window at the heavily forested Oregon landscape along the 101. No one would have thought she was a social worker from the way she dressed. Despite our office’s polite requests, Lina was wearing dark well-worn jeans, a plain white tank top, combat boots, and a leather biker jacket she’d made her unofficial uniform when she was still a bodyguard.

  It looked incredibly badass on her, especially with her jet-black hair and light brown skin, but ‘badass’ wasn’t the kind of vibe CPS wanted its investigators to project. To offset this, I did my best to dress and look as “domestic servant” as possible. Light gray skirt with matching blazer, white blouse, white skin, curly brown hair, and comfortable heels. Although, said shoes were currently in the back seat, as no heels on Earth were comfortable for eight hours of driving.

  “Lina, did you read the file or not?” I asked again.

  She mumbled something I couldn’t make out and fidgeted in her seat.

  “What was that?”

  “I said I skimmed over where we were going,” she admitted, still not turning to look at me. “I didn’t bother reading anything else because I figured you’d pick a nice and easy case for us after last time. Shame on me for thinking Special Investigator Kay Star would ever do anything easy.”

  “I don’t pick our assignments, Lina.” I sighed. “And this is your first case as a CPS investigator, which means you’re still in your probationary period. You haven’t exactly gone out of your way to make nice with our superiors, so you need to really put your best foot forward so I can give you a glowing review.”

  She turned around and pulled down her sunglasses, revealing her hypersensitive and hypnotically beautiful eyes. To my knowledge, I was the only person on Earth Lina willingly showed her eyes to. For reasons modern medicine couldn’t explain, Lina’s eyes were always fully dilated, and the tiny sliver of iris visible around her pupils was a deep ruby red. The whites of her eyes were pure white, no visible veins or blemishes at all, and even though they never changed shape, there was always an incredible amount of life sparkling in those eyes.

  I couldn’t get enough of those eyes, and they were why I asked her to be my girlfriend three months before she had joined CPS. I just couldn’t bear the thought of never seeing them again, and Lina knew it.

  “Can’t I just make up for any mistakes with extra credit?” she purred, giving me a smile that brought all kinds of thoughts and memories to mind.

  I reminded myself I was driving, and now wasn’t the time to indulge such fantasies, no matter how tempting Lina was.

  “I don’t think sharing our sex life with our bosses will get us anything but fired,” I said dryly.

  “If you say so,” Lina said, rolling her eyes and pushing her sunglasses back up. “But then, I guess if it would’ve helped you would be more open about your own kinky adventures. Like those twins . . .”

  I coughed, my cheeks heating up.

  “Don’t change the subject. We’re talking about you not paying attention to details.”

  “Excuse me?” Lina asked.

  “Written details,” I corrected.

  She crossed her arms and looked out the window again. I sighed. Lina’s eye condition made her incredibly sensitive to light and contrast, meaning she noticed things most other people didn’t. She explained it to me once as being able to read people’s micro-expressions—flashes of raw emotion that appeared before people could hide them. However, as great as she was with reading people, she was terrible with reading the fine print. Or any print for that matter . . .

  “Lina,” I asked, as a thought suddenly struck me. “Are you dyslexic?”

  There was a pause and then she replied, “If I say yes, will you stop making me deal with all this stupid paperwork?”

  My fingers tightened on the wheel and my lips pursed into a thin line.

  “Okay, okay,” Lina said as she reached back and grabbed my suitcase. “I’ll read the stupid file.”

  “Out loud,” I told her.

  Lina grumbled under her breath and put in the combination on my briefcase without asking, even though I changed it twice a week to keep her from getting in. It was insufferable how difficult it was to keep anything hidden from her. Granted, she already knew most of my bigger secrets, such as the kink parties I used to frequent, but there were still some things I hadn’t told her about my past; things about my family I was a bit more ashamed of than doing consensual adult things that included a safe word or two.

  I would tell her eventually though. Keeping secrets wasn’t a healthy part of any relationship, and she could easily find out on her own if she wanted to. With her skills, Lina could’ve been a legendary private investigator.

  Unlike me, I thought bitterly.

  “On March 10th, 2022, an abandoned pleasure yacht was found twenty miles off the coast of Warf Wood, Oregon,” Lina read in a very nasally impersonation of me. “Coast guard and local authorities investigated the yacht and discovered everyone inside the vessel was deceased, save for a young boy, five to six years of age, who was found in the main living quarters. No identification for the child was found, and he has given no name or reason for why he was on the boat or what happened to the rest of its occupants.

  “Agents Lin
a Smith and Kay Star have been . . . wait . . . specially requested?” She glanced over at me. “Specially requested by who?”

  “Keep reading,” I told her, keeping my eyes on the road.

  “Have been specially requested and dispatched to assess the child’s state of mind and determine if the child can be coaxed into cooperation with local and . . . oh, federal authorities.”

  She put down the files and looked at me.

  “So I’m guessing our unknown benefactor is behind this?”

  “Maybe,” I said. “I tried to get more details on what happened and who requested us before we left, but nobody seemed to know anything or even who to ask.”

  “Great,” Lina said, and I could almost hear her rolling her eyes. “And I’m only finding out about this now because . . . ?”

  “Because you should have read the file yourself when you got it three days ago, and when I went to your apartment yesterday to talk about it, you answered the door wearing nothing but your sunglasses, that biker jacket, and some tan lines,” I said, keeping my eyes pointedly on the road. “It was a bit difficult to think of anything after that.”

  Lina hummed in agreement.

  “So, I give you an amazing passion-filled night for our three-month anniversary, and you give me a road trip to Oregon to certify a child as traumatized. Yeah, remind me to break up with you later.”

  I sighed and took our exit off the freeway. We spent the rest of the drive in uncomfortable silence as we both mulled over what this “special request” meant. During our first case, someone with a lot of influence with the law forced Lina and me into uncovering an insane murder plot, despite the fact that I was just a CPS investigator and Lina was my reluctant bodyguard. Whoever it was seemed to have a vested interest in Lina especially, doing everything in their power to paint a bullseye on her back, until she had no choice but to finish the case.

  We never found out who was pulling the strings, but whoever it was made sure that Lina was offered a permanent position as my partner at CPS; a job she would normally never have been able to get given her criminal record. We’d accepted it as a reward for Lina’s hard work. Neither of us could say it was a job well done given how it ended, but the kid was now in protective custody, the killer was brought to justice, and Lina and I had made it out alive by the skin of our teeth.

  But it looked like whoever the puppet master was, they were trying to make us dance to their tune again. Only I wasn’t going to let them.

  “I’m not going to let us get roped into another life-threatening conspiracy,” I said, breaking the silence.

  “Sure,” Lina said, dragging the word out with an ocean of sarcasm.

  “I mean it,” I said. “We’re going to do the job we were assigned, and then leave. I already blocked the central office’s number for while we’re here, and I’m not opening any of their emails until we’re back safe at home. There’s going to be no changing our orders mid-assignment like last time.”

  “I don’t think they’ll be happy about that,” Lina said, smiling.

  “Well, there’s nothing I can do if the signal out here is terrible.” I smiled back. “But it’s just so bad out here that I can’t even send or receive any emails. In fact, it’s so bad my phone and laptop won’t even work until they’re connected to my home Wi-Fi. So strange.”

  “So, they think we’re walking blindly into whatever mess they have waiting, but you’re doing this specifically to show we can’t be manipulated again?”

  “Exactly,” I said.

  Lina reached over and kissed me on the cheek, her hand lingering on my leg.

  “Well, I wish I could do more to help, but I’m just your new little subordinate. Emphasis on the sub,” she said, giving my thigh a little squeeze.

  God, I hope the hotel room walls are soundproof . . .

  The trees on our left suddenly disappeared, giving us a gorgeous view of the North Pacific. The sun was shining brightly in a cloudless sky, making the ocean sparkle. I was tempted to roll down the window and enjoy the ocean breeze, but spring hadn’t quite gotten the reins away from winter yet and I didn’t want my eyeballs to freeze in their sockets.

  As the town came into view, I pulled off the road into a little lookout area for a better look. Warf Wood was exactly what you’d expect a little coastal town to look like, but something seemed . . . off about it.

  The docks were packed full of fishing boats of all shapes and sizes, though I couldn’t see any out at sea. The roads looked well maintained, but they were empty. There couldn’t have been more than three dozen buildings altogether, all similar-looking cottages and warehouses that looked straight out of the 1900s. The only modern-looking building was a large hospital that was so far inland it barely looked like it was part of the town at all. It towered over the rest of the buildings at an easy five stories and looked very out of place with its new bright white paint and helicopter landing pad on top.

  “Welcome to Normalville, USA,” Lina said sardonically. “Absolutely nothing at all worrying or creepy here . . .”

  “At least they have a hospital,” I said. Lina scoffed.

  “I guess we know where the town budget went. Shame they couldn’t spend a little money on the lighthouse.”

  “The what?”

  She pointed at a tiny island a few miles out from the coast. I squinted a little harder and barely made out a sky-blue lighthouse stretching up out of the island.

  “Whoa.” I whistled. “That thing’s almost invisible. Doesn’t that kind of defeat the purpose of a lighthouse?”

  “Not so long as it lights up,” Lina said, shrugging. “Still wanna do this? The nearest motel is only two hours away.”

  In reply, I put the car back into gear and pulled back on the road. We drove in silence, and fifteen minutes later we passed a sign saying “Welcome to Warf Wood,” and I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

  Warf Wood was just as empty up close as it had been from a distance. The buildings were at least a little more distinct. They all had the same shape, but the faded signs and the old dust-covered window displays were enough to at least differentiate them from their neighbors.

  As I drove down the center of Main Street, I noticed there were no signs anywhere. No speed limits, stop signs, or traffic lights, there weren’t even any street names posted anywhere. Not knowing what else to do, I slowed the car to a crawl on the empty road.

  “Where is everyone?” Lina asked, looking around. “It’s like the middle of the afternoon but there is nobody around.”

  “Maybe they’re on the water?” I offered, trying to ignore the fact that there were absolutely no boats out at sea earlier. “It is a fishing town after all.”

  “So why do I have the feeling we’re being watched?” Lina asked, twisting around in her seat to look behind us.

  I shuddered and looked around as well. It was good to know Lina felt it too, but it didn’t just feel like we were being watched.

  Several years ago, I had given a small speech during a family-hosted charity ball to convince Midwest upper-class so-and-sos to donate toward a low-income children’s hospital I’d worked with on several occasions. But as soon as I stepped up to speak, it had become clear that nobody would listen to a word I said.

  The room had been dark so I couldn’t see the faces of the crowd, but I could hear them muttering to each other about everything from my amateurish make-up to how my dress was clearly meant for a woman several pounds lighter than me. I hadn’t just been watched on that stage, I had been judged and found lacking. That was the same feeling I had as we slowly made our way up main street. I shivered.

  “Hey, can you check the file on where we’re supposed to check in?” I asked to break the silence.

  “Why you don’t just put this stuff in your phone is beyond me,” she mumbled, opening my suitcase again. I kept my eyes on the empty road as she flipped through the file, searching for the source of the eyes I felt on us.

  “Here it is,” Lin
a said. “Huh. It says we’re booked at a place called the Beacon Cove Inn, but we’re supposed to go to the sheriff’s station first. They even underlined it.”

  “That’s . . . weird,” I said. “Usually we don’t have anything to do with local authorities unless we need them.”

  “Maybe whoever ‘specially requested us’ wants to say hello,” Lina suggested dryly, flipping through the pages. “I say screw ’em. We’ve been on the road since before dawn, let’s just go to the hotel and order some room service.”

  “It’s an inn, Lina,” I reminded her. “That means it probably won’t have room service.”

  “You sure?” She held up the map. “According to this, there’s a bar attached to it.”

  The street was still empty when I glanced away for a moment to look at the map. When I looked back a second later, there was a hunched figure wearing a sky-blue dress right in front of the car.

  I slammed on the brakes. We weren’t going fast, but for some reason, the brakes didn’t engage. What happened next took only about half a second, but the adrenaline hit, and time seemed to slow down to a crawl. I watched as the body of an old woman violently slammed against the hood of the car. Then the car finally stopped and Lina and I were thrown forward by the momentum. The woman’s head snapped back as she was also thrown off, and her eyes locked with mine as my seatbelt caught me across the chest and knocked the wind out of me. My head whipped down and nearly smashed against the steering wheel. An instant later, the laws of physics sent me reeling backward and I bounced painfully against the cushioned seat and headrest.

  For a few seconds, all I could do was try to remember how to breathe while stars danced in front of my eyes from the whiplash. I could feel bruises starting to form where my seatbelt bit into me, and my neck protested angrily at the sudden movement, but as the painful fog began to clear in my head, a thought forced itself into my mind.

  I just hit someone.

  Chapter 2

  My body sprang into action before my mind finished processing what had happened. I jumped out of the car and hit the ground running toward the old woman. She was probably in her late seventies. Her pure white hair was done up in a squashed, old-fashioned bun. She was face down on the ground, and although the blue dress and matching coat she wore were covered in dirt and her limbs were bent at odd angles, there was no blood anywhere.