Stalked in Paradise

by Charley Marsh

  Alex raised a hand, then pointed at the cabin cruiser. Fox nodded, turned, and hurried back up the dock. Alex contemplated how to best capture Ed while he waited for Fox to join him. Apprehending Ed would be easier and less disruptive for the guests with two of them.

  Before Fox could reach Alex, the hatch slid open and Big Ed burst out of the cabin. He leaped on the dock and barreled into Alex, leading with his shoulder. Alex pivoted and stuck his foot out.

  Big Ed went sprawling face first onto the dock and Alex and Fox both pinned him down. He bucked and cursed and nearly threw them off until Fox pulled the restraints he’d grabbed from his back pocket and locked Ed’s wrists together behind his back.

  Alex gave him a nod. “Good thinking.” He leaned down close to the big man’s ear. “Where are they, Ed? What did you do with Cassie’s lawyer and Miss Monroe?”

  “Nothing. I don’t know who you’re talking about.”

  “Come on, Ed. I know you killed that lawyer last week. You thought he was Cassie’s lawyer, didn’t you?”

  Big Ed jerked. “She’s got no right divorcing me. Makes me look like a fool.”

  “Killing her lawyer won’t stop the divorce, Ed. There are always more lawyers. It’s a fact of life. Where is Miss Monroe?”

  Big Ed remained silent.

  “Fine. If you won’t help us then we don’t need you anymore. Fox, give me a hand rolling this guy off the dock, please.”

  “My pleasure.”

  They rolled Ed to the edge of the dock.

  “I’ll just push this boat away enough for you to slide him in, Alex. You ready?”

  Alex looked at Big Ed. “Last chance. What did you do with Cassie’s lawyer and Miss Monroe?”

  Ed sneered at Alex. “You won’t do it. You can’t. You’re a cop.”

  “Wrong, Ed. I’m not a cop any longer. And while I’m not fond of lawyers, I care about Miss Monroe.” He stood, placed his foot on Ed’s broad back and pushed him off the edge of the dock.

  The big man sank like a stone. The two men watched him struggle in the clear water.

  “How long you figure?” Fox asked.

  “I’ll give him a solid minute. Not long enough to drown him but long enough to make him think I will. Hold the boat off while I jump in, will you?”

  Alex went in after Ed and brought him gasping to the surface. He held him there, one hand on the dock, the other fisted in Ed’s shirt. “I’m giving you one last chance, Ed, then I’m dropping you. Where are they?”

  Ed spluttered, coughed, gasped. “Halfway Rock. I dumped them on Halfway Rock.”

  “Fox, help me haul this piece of slime onto the dock, please.”

  It took them ten minutes to get Ed out of the water and into the marina office. Alex fumed with impatience the whole while. He quickly explained the situation to Dix, locked Ed into the marina storeroom, and took the keys for the marina’s fastest boat.

  Five minutes later they were speeding out of the harbor into open water.

  “What’s Halfway Rock?” Fox gripped the edge of the windshield with both hands and spread his legs in an effort to stay on his feet as the boat bucked over the waves.

  “It’s a barren rock halfway between the resort island and a small, uninhabited island ten miles west of us.”

  “So they’ll be okay until we get there.”

  Alex shook his head. His hair whipped in the wind and his eyes watered, but he didn’t dare cut the boat’s speed.

  “You can only find Halfway Rock at low tide,” he answered. “The rest of the time it’s buried under ten feet of water.”

  “Well, shit,” Fox said.

  Alex spared him a look. “Exactly.”

  Chapter Thirty

  Conserving her energy, Harriet tread the warm water while she waited for Amos to catch up to her. The lawyer was game, but his shorter arms and legs couldn’t move his pudgy body through the water as fast or as easily as she could swim.

  At least the water was a comfortable temperature and hypothermia wouldn’t be an issue. If the light breeze held the waves would stay manageable.

  “You’re doing great, Amos. Take a break and tread water.” She couldn’t tell if her companion’s face was red from the sunburn or exertion. The thought that the lawyer might suffer a heart attack by pushing too hard filled her with panic. “Relax. You’re using too much energy.”

  “When I get back to the mainland I’m buying a membership to the local Y’s pool. I’m too fat to swim.”

  Harriet shook her head. The guy had spunk and hadn’t lost his composure or sense of humor even once, despite their difficult situation. “Think of seals, Amos. They’re big sacks of blubber and are as graceful as can be in the water.”

  “Seals. I need to think like a seal.” He dove under and came up closer to Harriet. “How was that?”

  She grinned at him. “Marvelous. I think you’ve got it. Shall we move forward again?” She turned onto her side and began a slow sidestroke, keeping a close watch on her companion.

  He did the same, although his strokes were short and jerky. “So, do you think your lawyer friend–what was his name?”

  “Bradley Higgins.”

  “Right. Do you think your friend Brad was in the wrong place at the wrong time and Cassie’s husband killed him?”

  “It makes sense.” Harriet stroked and thought about it. She had told Amos about the murder to take his mind off their predicament.

  “Bradley arrived the same day you were supposed to bring the final papers for Cassie to sign. I think Ed Whitfield found out that he was a lawyer and snapped. He thought Bradley was you–not that he knew your name–only that you were coming to the island to deliver the divorce papers. He choked Bradley to death, then hung him in the greenhouse to throw suspicion on my friend Solly. That’s my current hypothesis, anyway.”

  “Ed was dead set against Cassandra divorcing him,” Amos said. “I know I shouldn’t tell you that, but since we’re both going to die anyway I’m not feeling quite such a stickler about the rules.”

  “We aren’t going to die.” Harriet scowled at Amos. “At least not if I can do anything to prevent it. I just landed my dream job,” she added in a softer tone. “I’d like the chance to enjoy it.”

  They stroked in silence for several more minutes.

  “Why did you leave the air pad with Cassie’s husband? You were supposed to wait for me.”

  “Cassie only said she was sending someone to meet me, she didn’t specify who. By the time I realized Ed wasn’t taking me to her office it was too late–he popped me with a pressure syringe and that’s all I remember until I woke up in the middle of the ocean with you.”

  “At least he didn’t kill us. As long as we’re breathing we still have a chance.” Harriet lifted her head to make sure they hadn’t veered off course. The resort island looked no closer. She stifled a sigh and concentrated on moving her limbs smoothly through the water.

  Water water everywhere, and not a drop to drink. The tranquilizer Ed had used left her with a dry mouth and a dull, pounding headache. She let a little water dribble through her lips to wet her tongue and spit it out. She knew if she swallowed the salt water her body would become even more dehydrated.

  “Harry?”

  “Amos?”

  “I’m not sure how much longer I can go on. My arms feel like lead weights.”

  “Okay. Flip over and just float on your back and let the salt water hold you up. Rest. I’ll be here, right beside you.”

  Amos did as he was told. “You’re a nice girl, you know that, Harry? And beautiful too. I’m surprised you’re still single.”

  Harriet felt ridiculously flattered. Nobody had ever called her beautiful before. Even Solly would only admit to her being attractive. Since he never lied to her he’d never call her beautiful.

  “Yeah, well. I guess Mr. Right just hasn’t come along yet.” She thought of Alex, how safe she had felt in his arms, how his kiss had ignited something inside her that she didn’t k
now lived there. Would she ever see him again? Would she see her best friend Solly?

  Poor Solly. He’d be devastated to lose her this way. He’s the one who had taught her to swim, who insisted that she learn how because, as he said, anyone who lived on the ocean needed to know how to survive in the water.

  Solly was big on surviving, no matter what the circumstances you found yourself thrown into.

  She missed her friend. If he was was with them he’d be cracking jokes, making them laugh and helping them forget that they were close to drowning.

  She twirled a small circle while she tread water and stopped cold. There was something sticking up from the water’s surface, something that looked suspiciously like a shark fin.

  Harriet watched the fin for several long moments but it didn’t move. She frowned. That wasn’t right.

  “Amos.”

  “Yeah.”

  “There’s something over there.”

  Amos sank and came up spluttering. “What? Where?”

  “I’m not sure. I thought it was a shark at first–”

  “Shark?” Amos’a face paled beneath his sunburn and he sunk again.

  Harriet waited for him to surface. “–but it hasn’t moved so I don’t think it is,” she finished. “I want to swim over to it. You stay here, okay? Either tread water or float on your back. I won’t be long.”

  She didn’t wait for a reply. She struck out toward the object at a steady overhand crawl and soon reached it.

  “It’s a tree trunk,” she called back to Amos. “We can use it as a float. Swim to me.” She dove under the tree, came up on the other side, and began to push it toward Amos.

  “This could save our lives, Amos,” she said, when they met up and Amos grabbed wearily onto the tree.

  “Works for me. What’s the new plan?”

  “Support the upper part of your body on the tree and kick. It will take longer because the water will resist it, but eventually we’ll end up at the resort.”

  Amos pulled himself over the tree and set himself beside Harriet. The tree sunk into the water.

  Harriet quickly pushed herself off the trunk and it bobbed to the surface again. “It will only support one of us,” she told Amos. ‘You ride first and I’ll just hang on. I’ll kick until I’m tired. Then we’ll switch off.”

  Amos wrapped his arm around the base of the broken branch that Harriet had thought was a shark fin, propped his head against it, and promptly fell asleep.

  “That works too,” she said. It didn’t matter. Amos was nearly spent. Once Harriet had to support his body as well as her own she would have quickly fatigued and they both would have drowned. Finding the tree vastly improved their chances of survival. They were lucky it wasn’t a branchless palm or she never would have seen it.

  She looked at the branch jutting three feet into the air. They needed a flag, something to flutter in the wind and attract attention.

  Fortunately the bra she had put on that morning was a decent one. Actually it was the only bra she had until the purchases she’d made the day before were delivered.

  She slipped out of Solly’s borrowed white shirt and worked the sleeves over the end of the branch, careful not to disturb her sleeping companion. It hung limp and dragged in the water.

  “Dammit.” She pulled the shirt off the branch and wrung as much water as she could from the fabric, then stuck it on the branch again. This time she didn’t pull the shirt as far down on the branch. The breeze caught it, and while it didn’t flutter as wildly as Harriet had hoped, it did move. It was the best she could do.

  She kicked slowly, steadily, always keeping the cloud covered image of the resort in front of her. The sun felt hot on her bare shoulders and exposed back. She began to count her kicks, stopping every one hundred to just drift and rest. Amos slept on.

  Her headache grew worse, a steady throb at the base of her skull. Her tongue felt fat and thick in her mouth. She tried to work up some spit but failed. She placed her face in the water and opened her mouth, letting it flow around her tongue.

  When she picked her head up she saw Amos’s warm brown eyes watching her. “You okay?” he asked.

  “Thirsty. How about you?”

  “Thirsty. And an awesome headache.”

  “Yeah, that’s from whatever Ed gave us to knock us out.”

  “Another reason to hate the bastard.” Amos slid off the log. “Your turn to rest. I’ll kick for a while. I think we’re getting closer.”

  “We’re definitely getting closer.” She pulled her torso onto the log and let her legs hang in the water, then began to kick.

  “What are you doing?”

  “We’ll move faster if we both kick. I’m not that tired,” she lied.

  “I just want you to know that if we live through this I’m never leaving the mainland again.”

  “And if we live through this I’m never doing another favor for a friend.”

  They grinned at each other and kicked.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  The tide seemed to be racing toward the island. Alex knew the water wasn’t moving any faster than usual, but because he needed the tide to slow–in fact needed it to stop doing what it had been doing ever since the moon started spinning around the Earth–it seemed to be coming in faster than usual.

  The offshore breeze blew against the incoming tide, kicking up waves. Waves that Harriet and her companion would have to navigate. The fiberglass hull of the boat slapped hard against those waves, making for a rough ride, but Alex refused to slow their speed.

  “I see something white.” Fox handed the binoculars to Alex. “About two o’clock off the bow.”

  Alex eased back on the throttle and looked. He didn’t see anything. Then the boat rose on a wave and he saw the small flutter of white.

  “Let’s go check it out.” He handed the glasses back to Fox and pushed the throttle forward. The bow rose, then settled as they gained speed.

  Fox kept the binocs trained on the white flutter. “It’s them!” he cried. “I can see them now. A man and a woman. The woman just raised her arm. She’s trying to signal us.”

  Alex wished he could get more speed from the boat but the engine was maxed. He willed it forward as it slammed and bounced across the crests of the waves. Spray kicked up from both sides and a long rooster tail shot from the stern.

  Finally the boat drew close enough that Alex could see Harriet without the glasses. They were hanging onto a broken tree trunk waiting for the boat to reach them. Even from this distance, he could plainly see the relief and exhaustion on Harriet’s face.

  He cut the engine and floated gently to the tree. “Want a lift?” he asked as he reached over the side and grabbed Harriet’s hands.

  “I don’t know,” the man answered. “I thought we were doing pretty well on our own, thanks to Harry.”

  Alex felt a tiny twinge of jealousy that the lawyer called Harriet by her nickname. “He gets to call you Harry?” he said quietly as he lifted her into the boat. She stood trembling–her knees knocking together, her back, face, and shoulders sunburnt–and he let it go, ashamed of being so petty. What mattered was that she was alive.

  Harriet’s wet bra hid nothing and her thin, borrowed shorts clung to her hips. She realized that the man with Alex was looking at her with a great deal of interest. Suddenly embarrassed, she crossed her arms over her chest.

  Alex scowled at Fox, then whipped off his shirt and pulled it over Harriet’s head. She gave him a grateful smile. “Water?” she croaked.

  “Here.” Fox shoved a container in her hands, then lowered a ladder over the stern of the boat. “Can you climb?” he asked Amos.

  Amos pulled himself up the ladder with Fox’s help and collapsed on the deck. “I honestly didn’t believe we were going to make it,” he whispered. “If it wasn’t for Harry I’d be dead right now.”

  He rolled onto his back and grinned foolishly at his rescuers. “I can’t tell you how happy I am that I was wrong. It’s not often
you’ll hear a lawyer say that.”

  Introductions were made all around. Harriet rescued Solly’s shirt and spread it on the console to dry. Alex pulled her onto the seat next to him and turned the boat back toward the island. Fox settled with Amos in the aft seats.

  “Ed killed Bradley.” After downing the tube of water Harriet found her voice and broke the silence.

  “We figured that out. He’s being held until the mainland police can pick him up. Are you sure you aren’t hurt?”

  “He didn’t hurt me. I’m exhausted and my head aches and the sunburn hurts like crazy, but I’ll recover.” Fox offered another tube of water and she gave him a grateful smile. It tasted so good. It didn’t taste like salt, just cold and smooth. Refreshing. It helped soothe her raw throat.

  “Ed told me that he wasn’t the one who destroyed my stuff.”

  Alex took her hand and linked his fingers with hers. “I know. It was Lana. I’ll deal with her after we have the medics check you out and get you settled with Solly. I called him to let him know I was bringing you home.”

  “Lana?” She saw Alex flush and look uncomfortable. Was he remembering her warning about Lana and realizing he should have taken it more seriously? She waited for him to continue, curious to know if he’d admit that she had been right about the kitchen manager.

  “I guess she became fixated on me or something and considered you a threat. I’m sorry. It’s all my fault.”

  “How is it your fault? Did you lead her on?”

  Alex shook his head. “No, of course not. Until you came along I’d been keeping to myself. No flirting, no dates. Celibate.”

  Harriet fought to keep her voice even. “Until I came along? We haven’t exactly had a date, just pizza while you interrogated me. Oh, and the shopping trip to the mainland, but that wasn’t a date.”

  “I intend to rectify that as soon as possible.”

  Was Alex telling her that he cared about her?

  He brought Harriet’s waterlogged hand to his lips and kissed her scraped wrist. Heat shot through Harriet’s body and she shivered.