Just Follow the Money

by Jinx Schwartz

  Juanita motioned for Sascha to attack.

  “Tsk, tsk, Sascha. You knife me, boat don’t leave. You guys have a backup plan?”

  Juanita’s eyes narrowed. “We might tell you where the money is because you won’t be around to spend it. The dog? You start the boat, and we’ll see.”

  “Sounds reasonable to me. You do know I have to leave this bedroom in order to do so, right?”

  “Of course I do. You think I’m stupid?”

  I sure hope so.

  “Let’s go. Hey, Roberto, did you know that Sascha and Juanita are kissin’ cousins? In my country, that makes Sascha a child molester.”

  Juanita shoved me up the steps. “For the record, I was the one who seduced her. Now, move.”

  I walked through the main salon and moved toward the stairs to the aft sun deck and flying bridge. “Stop right there! Where are you going?”

  “Topsides to start the engines. I can’t light them off from down here,” I fibbed.

  “Okay, then, but no tricks.” She raised her voice. “Sascha, if you hear anything at all out of place, kill that dog.”

  “I will,” Sascha yelled back, but her voice held no resolve.

  Yippee! Of all the half-Russian lesbian nannies in the world, I get one who might be a dog lover? With any luck at all, Po Thang was doing his best hang-dawg eye-beg right about now.

  At the steering station, I removed the canvas cover, then sat down in the captain’s chair, made sure both throttles were pushed all the way forward and the gears all the way back. I hit the START button on the port engine, and nothing happened.

  “Juanita, I think my battery bank is dead. I haven’t started the engines in quite a while, you know.” Except for going out to Espiritu Santu a few days back, but who’s counting?

  “I don’t believe you. I said no tricks or the dog dies.”

  “Get real. Do you think I’d do something that would get my dog stabbed?”

  “I think you’re a stone bitch and I’m going to count to ten. If those engines don’t start, I’ll tell Sascha to finish off your dog and Roberto, you hear me? One. Two.”

  “Wait! Wait! I see the problem. The ignition switches are turned off. Hang on a minute, I’ll have her going real fast.”

  “Amazing how that happened,” she said, sarcasm dripping from her red-lips like blood after a vampire kill. How does an eighteen-year-old get so cynical. Oh, wait, she lives in Hollywood. Probably a Twilight fan?

  “Can I just ask one question first?”

  “Oh, for God’s sake. What?”

  “Why Roberto? I thought he was your favorite cousin. And Sascha? I saw them sucking face in an alleyway a few days ago. You just looking to make your little ménage à trois into a twosome?”

  “I guess you aren’t as smart as Nacho says you are. Yes, Roberto was useful. We needed him.”

  “And now you don’t.”

  “Start this damned thing.”

  “Your wish is my command.” I hit the BOTH ENGINES START button, something I never do, and Juanita was about to find out why.

  Raymond Johnson’s big diesels roared and when those props bit in, my boat, had it not been still tied to the dock, would have shot backwards across the waterway, smashing into a boat docked there. As it was, I heard what sounded like a gunshot, the boat slewed to one side, and I figured I’d yanked at least one cleat from the dock, but the other bow line and the aft lines, although groaning loudly, seemed to hold.

  I was hanging onto the steering wheel, the only reason I didn’t go flying myself. As it was, my arms were almost pulled from their sockets.

  Juanita had much more to worry about.

  When the forward cleat, still tied to my high tensile dock line went airborne, I saw it coming and ducked. It barely cleared my seatback and nailed Juanita. Even over all the noise I heard her scream and then drop like a rock.

  Killing the engines while in gear and full throttle made an ominous sound that I figured was going to cost me a fortune in parts one day soon.

  I glanced at Juanita, whose face was a bloody mess, but she wasn’t my problem at the moment. The boat was still tossing in the slip, but I’d been on her long enough to weather just about any storm, so I bounced off railings and furniture and made my way below, making a quick stop at my desk.

  Rushing down the steps to my cabin, I found Sascha, Roberto and Po Thang in a pile, thrown against the aft bulkhead. Po Thang was howling in fear, Roberto was out cold, and Sascha, just as I reached out, got her bearings and slashed out with that damned knife.

  I had to get her away from my dog and Roberto before she stabbed one of them. “Sascha, put down the knife and listen to me. So far you haven’t done anything wrong. All you guys have to do is give back the money, and you are home free.”

  “That’s easy for you to say,” she snarled. “You have your big boat and your rich boyfriend. Juanita and I have nothing. The family will disown us both for being lesbians, and we cannot make any decent livings here in Mexico. We will live like peasants.”

  “What do you want me to do?” I asked.

  “Where is Juanita?”

  “She’s nursing a headache. Even if she survives, I don’t think she’ll want to.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Her face. It’s sort of split in half. Go see for yourself.” Then, because lying for a cause is justified, I added, “She’s asking for you.”

  Sascha looked undecided for a second, then raised the knife high over her head with both hands. “Screw her and you.”

  “Stop!” I yelled.

  She didn’t.

  When seconds count, the cops are only minutes away.

  As her arms arced down with the knife point slashing toward my dog’s head, I raised my Taurus .380 semi-automatic and shot six rounds at her fists and the knife. I saved one in the chamber for good measure, on the off chance she somehow was counting shots and stupidly thought I was done. However, thanks to my laser, I managed to do enough damage to deflect her aim and make her drop the knife harmlessly onto the bed. As I lit up her temple with my beam, she got lucky and fell over on her side, cradling her arms.

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  Sascha repeatedly screamed at the top of her lungs, Po Thang’s howl increased a couple of decibels, Roberto’s eyes flew open, and I pocketed the gun.

  I pushed Sascha out of the way, grabbed the knife, and quickly cut Po Thang free of Roberto. Po Thang took off like a shot, up the stairs and off the boat. He’d done the same thing when someone set off fireworks nearby one night.

  I let him go and checked to make sure no blood was spurting from Sascha’s arms. Satisfied I hadn’t hit an artery, I pushed her into the head, and slammed the door. Roberto managed to sit up and realized he was bound with ropes. “What about me?”

  “Jury’s still out on you, Chef. I have to go check on Juanita. Scoot over and lean up against that door. I don’t want Sascha to get out, and believe me, neither do you.”

  Evidently he remembered enough about the situation to say, “I must agree.” Inching over, he leaned his back against the door and dug his heels into the carpet.

  “Good boy. If you cooperate, we’ll try to figure out how to get you out of this mess. I promise.”

  “Thank you. I fear I have been played for a fool.”

  I couldn’t argue with that.

  Juanita already had help, as people were all over the dock and boat, alerted to trouble by the brouhaha. One boater was feeling Juanita’s pulse while another wrapped a towel around her ruined face. I heard a siren close by so didn’t bother calling 9-1-1. That girl was going to be looking for a really good plastic surgeon in the near future, if she lived.

  I turned to go find Po Thang when I heard him bark and spotted him and Jan on the dock. “Well, good gawd a mighty, Hetta, what on earth have you gone and done now?” my friend asked. She let go of Po Thang’s collar and we ran to each other, meeting in the main salon.

  I hugged him, felt wet, matted fur,
and when I pulled my hands away, they were covered with blood. Lots of it. I let loose with a string of expletives and started looking for wounds, but Jan, now by my side, said, “It’s not his. I already checked. But you? You look like you just got dragged down a dirt road behind an ornery horse.”

  Looking down at my hands and clothes, I saw I was pretty bloodied up myself, but so far as I knew, none of it was mine, either. Jan handed me a roll of paper towels. “Get into my cabin, change clothes, and wipe that blood spatter off your face and arms before the cops get here. Whose blood is all this?”

  “Mostly Sascha’s. Damned Rusky brought a knife to a gun fight.”

  Before I went into Jan’s cabin to wipe down and change clothes, I sent Jan to attend to Sascha and Roberto.

  The guest cabin bathroom mirror revealed that I indeed resembled a dragging victim, and that I also had blood splatters in my hair from that cleat hitting Juanita while I had my back to her. I removed what I could, thanked L’Oréal for my recent touchup that now worked as a coverup, and then heard what I hoped were medics pounding onto my deck. Slipping on a sweat set Jan leaves on the boat, I went out to face the music. It was only a matter of time until the cops zeroed in on me.

  Jan and Roberto waited in the main salon, sitting quietly and alone. Roberto, also cleaned up, was wearing one of Jenks’s jackets and a pair of my blue jeans.

  Before I could say a word, Jan said, “Military medics are seeing to Sascha and Juanita. Just sit down here with us and button your lips, no matter who asks anything.”

  Roberto whispered, “As soon as Jan cut me loose I made a call to Nacho, and he arrived right after the first fire truck. He took command of the…situation.”

  “You mean the tragic accident,” Nacho corrected Roberto, as he entered the cabin.

  Epilogue

  Nacho handled the Mexican police and Port Captain when they arrived. Sascha and Juanita had already been taken to the military hospital and were later transferred by air to another in Guadalajara.

  Roberto left the boat that day with Nacho and Cholo, and was back at work at El Molokan the next week.

  There was a small blurb in the La Paz paper about a boating accident, in which two women were badly injured by a propeller when they fell off a yacht as it was leaving the marina. Both women, one American and one Mexican citizen, will recover, but required medical attention.

  An American gossip magazine reported that Juanita, the daughter of a child film star from some obscure sitcom, was injured in a boating accident in Mexico, and would require extensive facial reconstruction.

  Jan and I split the fifty-grand reward given to me by Juan Tomato, but I am spending ten of my half on boat damage, interior cleanup, and dock repair. The money I made from my French assignment, El Jefe’s payment for services rendered in Cannes, and the thirty left from his reward has me feeling less like a future bag lady.

  According to the internet, Don Juan de Tomato called the investigation into his Russian mafia ties a witch hunt, and without any evidence to prove otherwise, it died on the vine.

  Nacho told us that El Jefe had his suspicions about an insider involved in Juanita’s kidnapping because he kept three million in his safe at all times, and almost everyone in the family knew it.

  However, once he was given back the suitcases containing the remainder of the marked bills, he chose not to further investigate who, why, or how it was recovered. According to Nacho, sometimes families prefer to clean up their messes internally, especially where the Mexican monied elite are concerned.

  The prince has forgiven me for trashing his yacht, especially since El Jefe paid for the cleanup. Last I heard, the two of them were planning a fishing trip off Cabo.

  Rhonda and Cholo are still an item and are looking for a yacht for when he retires. She isn’t overly happy about his frequent work-related absences, but hey, welcome to the ranks of us women with retired and active duty special ops dudes.

  Speaking of, Jenks is due into La Paz in a few days, and we plan to cruise Mexican waters for a few weeks before he goes back to the Middle East.

  Thanks to apples, lettuce, tuna fish, and daily Mexican Zumba classes run by those tiny women with no bones, I’ve lost eight pounds so I can pack them back on during our vacation. Po Thang is in a snit over the lack of leftovers and has probably slimmed down himself, but who can tell under all that fluff? Hmmm. Maybe I’m not fat, just fluffy?

  THE END

  OTHER BOOKS BY JINX SCHWARTZ

  The Hetta Coffey Series

  Just Add Water (Book1)

  Just Add Salt (Book 2)

  Just Add Trouble (Book 3)

  Just Deserts (Book4)

  Just the Pits (Book 5)

  Just Needs Killin’ (Book 6)

  Just Different Devils (Book 7)

  Just Pardon My French (Book 8)

  Other Books

  The Texicans

  Troubled Sea

  Land of Mountains

  Boxed Sets

  Hetta Coffey Boxed Collection (Books 1-4)

  Hetta Coffey Boxed Collection (Books 5-8)

  If you have enjoyed this book, please tell your friends about Hetta, or post a short review on Amazon. Word of mouth is an author's best friend, and is much appreciated.

  I have editors, but boo-boos do manage to creep into a book, no matter how many great people look at it before publication. If you find an error, it’s all on me. And, should you come upon one of these culprits, please let me know and I shall smite it with my mighty keyboard! You can e-mail me at jinxschwartz@yahoo.com

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  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Holly Whitman has been the editor of every one of my books, and she keeps me out of the ditch when I write myself into one. The last eyes on the book before I hit the "publish" button, are Donna Rich's. Thanks Holly and Donna.

  I have some amazing beta readers! I have to thank all the sharp eyed readers for catching boo-boos I overlooked. And here they are, in no particular order: Sybil Dean, Frances Moore, Carmen Repsold, Jeff Brockman, Jenni Cornell, William Jones, Wayne Burnop, Lela Cargill, Krystyna Sews, Steven Brown and Karen Kearns.

  Also, we have to thank Kepler Biard, our cover dog. Kepler's official name is "Highmark Wingstar De Stella Nova". He and his one sister were born under the Strawberry Moon on 6/20/16 in the back of a Ford F-250 barely breathing. A rocky start, but all became better that same day. He is named in honor of astronomer Johannes Kepler, assistant to Tycho Brahe (Tycho, cover dawg for Just Pardon My French, is Kepler's father). When he's not keeping up with his telescope and planets orbiting the sun he's studying the flight of tennis balls around the yard. Life is good for Kepler in Colorado. Currently he's fine tuning his paddle-board and lake surfing skills. He’s a very good boy who deserves a big treat for not eating the twenties in the money shot on the cover.

  And for the cover art, we have Karen Phillips to thank.