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Eco-Watch was terrified of being in the ocean. When he was fourteen years old, he’d been involved in a boating disaster. The sights and sounds of that day as the boat sank were imprinted into his brain, and anytime he was even close to being on a ship, the flashbacks would begin, the fear would grip him, and he couldn’t convince himself that the sea, if given a second chance, would not finish the job it started all those years ago.
    As they passed over the group of protesters, Donovan saw the smattering of signs, all condemning Eco-Watch for the coldblooded murder of helpless fisherman. As they swept past, he also spotted a biblical reference:
Thou shall not kill.
Donovan momentarily contemplated the commandment, but it did nothing to alter his intentions toward the people who’d threatened him.

CHAPTER FIVE
    As the helicopter topped the lush hills and banked out over the water, Donovan could see the rakish dark-blue hull and the white superstructure of the
Triton.
The yacht looked distinctly forlorn perched on the white sand beach that seemed to stretch endlessly in both directions.
    â€œDead ahead is Polihale State Park,” Glen said over the intercom. “It’s one of the most remote beaches on this side of the island. Only four-wheel-drive vehicles will get you in and out.”
    Donovan spotted the road, set well back from the high-tide mark. As low as they were flying, he couldn’t see a single structure along the entire beach. Rising above the sand, the
Triton
was tilted twenty degrees to port. The sleek, pristine, one-hundred-sixty-foot megayacht soared above the official vehicles parked nearby in the sand. Including its mast, which held numerous antennas and radar domes, the
Triton
reached nearly six stories into the air and dwarfed the small collection of boats that had gathered offshore to take in the scene. Donovan had been on the vessel once, several years ago when it was moored in San Diego. He remembered John explaining that he could invite a maximum of twelve guests with a staff-to-guest ratio of one-to-one. A huge salon with a full bar, a library, hot tub, a gym, a theatre, elevators to take passengers from below decks up to the flybridge where one could enjoy all the creature comforts. The vessel was powered by twin one-thousand-horsepower Caterpillar diesel engines. She held over 16,000 gallons of fuel and could generate up to sixteen knots and had a range of 6,000 nautical miles. Donovan was happy the ship was intact; a fuelspill in these waters would be catastrophic to the fragile ecosystem.
    They passed over the
Triton,
slowed, and circled in preparation to land.
    â€œHudson didn’t mention John’s helicopter?” Donovan said as he twisted in his seat and found the light gray
H
within a circle painted on the aft quarterdeck. “Where’d it go?”
    â€œGood question,” William replied.
    â€œMr. Nash,” Glen’s voice sounded over the intercom, “I’m listening to a report that a fishing vessel has been spotted about twenty-five miles west of here by a Coast Guard C-130 transport. The ship nearly collided with a sightseeing boat. So far, they haven’t responded to any transmissions or altered course.”
    â€œCan we get out there and take a look?” Donovan said without hesitation.
    William shot Donovan a worried glance as the chopper abruptly climbed away from the beach to race out over the water.
    â€œIt’s only three miles offshore of Niihau,” Glen said. “The C-130 crew reports the ship’s speed is at least ten knots with no sign of slowing.”
    â€œThat means we’ve got less than twenty minutes before it comes ashore,” Donovan said as the ocean flashed past at 175 mph. They crossed the seventeen-mile strait between Kauai and the far smaller island of Niihau, then skirted the north side of Niihau between the main archipelago and a small island. Once clear of the rocky cliffs, they