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going?” he screamed. “Get back here and answer my questions!”
    Turning with deliberate poise, the man set his gaze on him. “ If your wife went overboard, sir, and if she survived the fall, there is no way she could tread that water for three hours. I’m sorry, but we’ve resumed our normal heading.”
    “You what ?” And he thought of Stacey in the water, watching the ship fade away as he had. He struggled against the monster restraining him, flailing wildly until he was completely spent. The man then dropped him to the floor. Crumbling to his knees, Jack attempted to get a grip on himself. He didn’t know that Stacey went overboard. He didn’t know that she was…
    His hands were shaking, his eyes wide with incomprehension.
    “Get him some clothes,” he heard someone say. He looked down at himself. He was still naked. Under any other circumstance, he would be embarrassed. Right now, however, he couldn’t bring himself to care at all.
    “You left me naked for three hours?” he seethed.
    A pair of pants was tossed to him, his own from one of the dressers. “Put these on, will you?”
    Once he had his pants on, the man with all the good news said, “Mr. Green, I’m Doug Bennington, head of security on this ship. We’re going to do everything we can to find out what happened to you and to locate your wife. But first, I need you to do a couple of things. One, appreciate the miracle of your being alive right now. Two, stop assaulting my men. And three,” he handed him a note, “explain this to me.”
    Jack took the note from him and tried to calm down as the words danced all over the place in his trembling grasp. Finally, he looked up to Bennington. “Where did you find this?”
    “It was on the bedside table. You didn’t write it?”
    He shook his head.
    “Is it your wife’s handwriting?”
    He stumbled for some kind of meaning or explanation, but nothing came. It didn’t make sense. “I think so.”
    Bennington sighed. “Are you still sticking with your masked men story?”
    “What?” Jack’s eyes snapped upward. “You think I’m making it up? You think… What the hell do you think? You think we… You think I …”
    “I know only three things. We fished you out of the water, your wife is missing, and there’s a suicide note that she supposedly wrote. How do you think it looks, Mr. Green?”
    He didn’t say anything. What could he say? His mind was too busy swimming against the whirlpool of disaster for any kind of rational response.
    “Well,” Bennington said, “I’m afraid we’re going to have to confine you to your room for the duration of the trip.”
     
    * * * *
     
    A couple hours later, Jack was alone, sitting on the bed. He was running every detail he could recall over and over inside his spinning head, but they were all insignificant and offered no clue as to why masked men would want him and Stacey dead. He thought of Joseph, his little blond-haired buddy, and missed him more than he ever thought possible. But how could he return home without Stacey? How could he survive his son’s reaction to that news? He had to find her.
    There was a knock on the door before the beep of an electronic card unlocked it. Bennington stepped in.
    “Anything?” Jack asked, barely able to lift his head.
    “We’re still looking.”
    Jack thrust a hand through his hair. “So what happens now? Besides holding me prisoner?”
    “It will be handled by the police force once we reach port.”
    “What police force? You better mean the FBI, pal.”
    “The country that holds the ship’s registration is responsible for handling these matters.”
    “Excuse me?”
    “I understand your frustration, but that’s the way things are,” Bennington explained.
    Jack leaned forward, his eyes on fire. “You’re telling me, that since the ship is registered in the Bahamas, it’s up to the Bahamian police to investigate what happened to my wife?”
    “That is correct.”
    Standing, Jack began to