Hunted in the Keys

by Matthew Rief

  Without another word I jumped into action, moving swiftly towards the house. It was a small, old style, two-story house and it was surrounded by tall coconut trees that were swaying chaotically in the wind. As I moved towards the back window, I saw a faint glow of light radiating from within. Crouching under the window sill beside a large propane tank, I peeked over and saw two guys in the living room. One guy was wearing a black leather jacket that was dripping water onto the hardwood floor below. He held a video camera in one hand, and in the other he held what looked like a Magnum revolver which he kept aimed at the second guy who was tied to a chair, seated in the middle of the room.

  The guy tied up was gagged and looked like he’d been used as a punching bag by a professional heavyweight boxer for a few hours. His face was swollen and covered in blood and he looked so disoriented that I expected he would pass out at any moment. His right leg appeared to be broken since it was bent sideways at a ninety-degree angle halfway between his foot and his knee. He was wearing a blue polo shirt, brown pants and a pair of boat shoes. Though the sun had risen over the horizon, the thick, black clouds blotted out everything but a faint glow and the only light in the house came from a candle in the kitchen and another on a small table beside the couch in the living room.

  The bad guy, after yelling and spitting at the tied-up guy, set his camera on a nearby table and cocked his revolver. The woman had said that they’d planned to kill him, but this looked more like an execution. Before the guy could level his pistol on his target, I rose from my crouched position, took aim with my Sig and fired off a round. Shattering through the glass, it hit the guy right in the side of his head, exploding in a mess of blood and bone. Before his corpse had collapsed onto the hardwood floor, I was throwing my body through the window. Landing on my feet inside what looked like a sorry excuse for a kitchen, I did a quick scan of the house. After I’d checked both floors, making sure there was no one else inside, I turned off the video camera resting on the table then ran over to the beat-up guy and removed the gag from his mouth.

  Grabbing my dive knife, I cut the ropes which had been tied so tightly that his wrists had turned bright red. I tried to talk to him, tried to get him to stay awake, but I could tell that he was fading in and out of consciousness. Walking over to a small sink, I opened the faucet and was slightly surprised to see water pouring out. Grabbing a nearby bowl, I filled it with water then splashed it over the guy’s bloodied face.

  He thrashed his body, and I had to catch him to keep him from falling out of the chair. Strands of his black hair dripped down, covering the top of his beaten face as he looked around the room, trying to figure out what had happened. He had a decent build, though it was easy to tell from his slightly protruding belly that he spent quite a bit more time on a couch than a treadmill.

  “Who are you?” he said, staring at me with intensity in his eyes. Then, looking at the ground, he saw the dead guy lying in a big pool of his own blood with a partially disfigured head. He opened his mouth to continue, but before he could, he was cut off by the slamming of the front door.

  In the blink of an eye, my Sig was aimed at the door, ready to pull the trigger at a moment’s notice.

  “Christian!” a woman’s voice cried. The woman, along with her two daughters ran through the door. She cried frantically as she wrapped her arms around her husband. Part of me wanted to remind her that I’d instructed her to wait in the bushes, but I didn’t see what good it would have done.

  While embracing his wife and daughters the guy turned to me and said, “Thank you.” His voice was raspy and I could tell that every breath was a struggle given the pain he was in.

  “They were trying to take us away and this man saved us,” one of his daughters said, tears streaking down her face.

  “You killed them?” the man asked, his eyes wide and filled with worry. I nodded and he gave a big sigh of relief. “I was unable to hold them off on my own.” He coughed up some blood, cleared his throat and continued, “The four of them surrounded us and caught us by surprise.”

  My heart sank and my eyes narrowed. Placing my hand on his shoulder, I stared into his dark brown eyes and said, “Did you say four?”

  CHAPTER

  NINE

  His mouth fell open and his eyes grew wide. “Yea. That’s how many there were.”

  I grabbed my Sig from my leg holster and, as if the fourth guy had read my mind, I heard the sound of gunshots coming from outside the old house. There was a lot of thunder and lightning, but I knew the difference in the sounds they made vice a gunshot’s sounds. I listened while moving towards the door, but they were coming from a good distance away, from down by where I’d left my Zodiac.

  Shit, I thought as I gripped my Sig and sprinted down the sandy pathway as quickly as I could towards my boat. It was about five hundred feet through the bushes and palm trees and by the time I reached it I was too late.

  The fourth guy had already shoved off on his patrol boat, had the engines running and was gunning it away from the island, his boat crashing over the massive rolling waves. I raised my Sig and took aim. He was far away and he was moving sideways parallel to the beach, making the shot difficult. When I had him lined up behind the middle white dot of my leveled sight, I fired off two quick shots. The first shattered the port side windscreen, rocketing inches from his face and the second hit him square in the chest, causing him to fall sideways. In an instant, his body vanished from view as he fell onto the deck.

  While he fell, the guy must have hit the throttles because the boat was motoring through the waves much slower than before. I kept my Sig aimed at the boat, making sure the guy wasn’t going to get back up any time soon. When I was convinced the guy was down for the count, I ran over to my Zodiac which was still tied off along the shrub line. But as I reached it, I realized that it was riddled with bullet holes all across the hull and in both of the pontoons, which had already deflated enough to make the boat unusable. Cursing my unknown assailant, I leaned over and searched what remained of my boat. Not only had the asshole ruined it, but he’d also taken my bags along with my sniper rifle.

  A loud strike of lightning flashed across the morning sky as I looked out over the intense, white-capped ocean. I estimated that the patrol boat was about a half a mile from the beach and it was being propelled farther and farther away with each passing second. The massive waves and the torrential rainfall, which had only worsened since I’d arrived on Loggerhead, made going after the boat impossible. As much as I hated it, I could only watch as it drifted into the heart of Fay, taking my supplies along with it.

  I did a thorough search of my Zodiac, lifting up the deflated pontoons and looking along the edges of the rigid hull. To my surprise, I realized that the guy hadn’t taken everything. He left my camelback which had my rain slicker, three MRE’s and my night vision monocular still inside of it. He also left my new spear gun which I grabbed along with the three spears. Unfortunately, he’d taken all of my extra ammunition, so all I had were the two mags I’d grabbed earlier for my Sig. After searching every inch of my boat, I put on my rain slicker, strapped on my backpack and headed quickly back towards the house. Though he’d said there were only four, I kept my guard up anyway with my Sig in my right hand and my spear gun in my left, ready to fire my Sig at a moment’s notice while keeping my head on a swivel.

  When I opened the front door to the house and entered, the guy, his wife, and their two daughters stared at me as they stood huddled beside an old fireplace with a few dying embers inside of it. The guy’s face was so messed up that I couldn’t tell what his expression was, but I assumed he looked relieved to see that it was me and not one of the other guys.

  Forcing the door shut behind me, I walked over to them as the house creaked and groaned from the powerful winds. The light from the candles illuminated the room, flickering around us.

  “Were there any other boats?” I asked, my voice stern and resolute.

  The four of them stared at me for a
moment, then the guy answered, “Not that we saw. It was just the one.” His wife had grabbed a damp towel and was patting her husband’s face with it, cleaning off the drying blood. She lifted a glass of water to his lips and he took one sip before coughing out the attempted second. After clearing his throat, he added, “Who are you?”

  “His name is Logan,” his wife said. In the light of the room, I could see that she was pretty, even given the fact that she was worried as hell and soaking wet from head to toe. She had medium-length brunette hair, light hazel eyes and freckles surrounding her nose. She looked about five feet, eight inches tall with a lean, athletic build beneath her wet skinny jeans.

  “My name is Chris Hale,” the guy said. “This is my wife Cynthia and my two daughters Jordan and Alex.”

  I estimated that Jordan was probably fifteen. She had her mother’s brown hair though her eyes were slightly darker. Alex was the youngest daughter, though she looked tall for her age, and she also had brunette hair and hazel eyes. Both girls looked scared out of their minds and understandably so. They’d been seconds away from being taken away and forced into a life of violence, drugs, and prostitution.

  I nodded to each of them then said, “Well, Chris, it’s a little rough out there for a pleasure cruise. What were you doing out on the water in the middle of a tropical storm?”

  The old house shook as a violent gust of wind batted against it. Tropical Storm Fay was getting closer, it’s winds growing more and more powerful with each passing second.

  Chris sat in thought for a moment then, after glancing at his wife, he looked at me and said, “I was running.” A loud roar of thunder filled the air. Chris continued, “I’m an attorney and I represented the state in the case against Benito Salazar, the notorious gang leader who fled Cuba and had been wreaking havoc around the world for over a decade. Before he was taken away to serve his double-life sentence, he told me that he would break free and that he would track me down and kill me and my family.” He paused for a moment to clear his throat then continued, “He proclaimed it as he was being taken away from the courtroom. Cursing my name as he stared me down with his evil eyes.” He looked away from me, down at his feet. Then, regaining his strength, he said, “Salazar escaped from his Cuban prison two days ago. We were in Cancun and left for the states as quickly as we could.”

  “You were the prosecution lawyer? And he’s sworn revenge against you?” I shook my head. “I’m willing to wager that asshole would’ve been put away for life no matter what you said.”

  “Perceptions can be shifted; evidence can be overlooked. If he’d been able to buy off both myself and the judge, it’s very likely he’d have gotten off pretty easy, or at least much easier than he did. But regardless of that, you must also understand that Salazar is a maniac who tends to disregard logical thinking.”

  I thought it over for a moment then said, “So you and the judge were the only ones who didn’t budge?”

  Chris nodded. “And Salazar had him and his whole family murdered the same day that he escaped from prison.”

  Holy shit, I thought as I looked up at the ceiling, shaking my head. Here I thought this was just another case of piracy in the Caribbean. A rich guy and his beautiful family taken hostage by sex slavers looking to make a quick buck by ruining people’s lives. The truth, it seemed, was much worse.

  “All flights were grounded and we thought we could beat Fay and make it to the states where a few detectives from Miami were going to meet us,” Cynthia said, wiping tears from her face and holding their daughters close to them as she continued to clean off blood. “But we were very, very wrong.”

  Shifting his beat-up body, Chris said, “They tracked us down and caught up to us about ten miles southwest of here. They yelled at us to stop and when we didn’t, they tore our boat to shreds with automatic gunfire. I had her cruising as fast as she could at forty knots, but they still stayed with us. It wasn’t long before I lost control, slammed into a reef and then crashed onto this island.”

  “How did they find you?” I asked.

  Chris sighed. “They had a tracker hidden on the boat. By the time I found it and destroyed it, it was already too late.”

  “When did you destroy it?”

  “Just before crashing,” he said as Cynthia continued to wipe the blood from his face and arms, tending to his wounds as best as she could.

  Shit, I thought. That meant that Salazar and his gang knew where they were, and he also knew that they were stuck there, at least until the storm passed. And I was stuck with them, I thought as the image of my Zodiac which, having been riddled with bullets, now rested deflated in the sand. Reaching into my pocket, I pulled out my high powered, Subgear Prolight flashlight and turned it on. Shining it around the room, I wanted to see what we had in the house that we could use and since my satellite phone had been taken, I kept a watchful eye out for anything resembling a radio.

  I searched an adjoining room and found nothing but old boxes filled with papers and memorabilia of the island. Upstairs, the house had a small bedroom which had an old bed, a large chest of drawers and a closet full of park ranger uniforms. Unfortunately, there wasn’t anything that would help our situation. I went back downstairs and headed for the front door.

  “What are you doing?” Chris asked before I grabbed the doorknob.

  Turning to him I said, “If everything you say is true then we need to find a way off this island. The Coast Guard will be on alert for stranded vessels and might be able to reach us, even in this storm.”

  Before he could reply I opened the door and powerful gust of wind slammed into me as I quickly stepped through and shut it sternly behind me. Sheets of tropical rain flew sideways across my body as I stepped down onto the beach, heading for the lighthouse. The wooden door at its base was locked so, rearing back, I slammed my right heel into its center, causing the door to crash open. The first level of the lighthouse appeared to be a small museum with pictures all over the walls of the island, showing how it looked during its various stages over the years.

  I headed up the spiral staircase that seemed to go on forever until I finally reached the top. The blinding lamp rotated in circles, casting a powerful beam of light through the windows around me. It was a great view from up there, and even though the sky was filled with black clouds and thick rain, I was still able to see a good distance out over the horizon in all directions. On the other side of the light, I saw a small metal box and, moving over to it, I pulled open the door, causing its hinges to squeak. Inside of it, I found a black portable radio, but after looking it over it appeared to be broken as none of the lights came on when I flipped the ON switch.

  Feeling somewhat defeated and wondering how I could find a way to get in contact with anyone near Key West, I set the broken radio back inside the box and headed back around the light to the top of the staircase. Just as I was about to take the first step something caught my eye out over the water. Leaning closer to the glass, I let my eyes focus for a moment. Out on the water to the West, on the same line as the wrecked yacht but about a half of a mile from the shoreline, there was a boat heading straight for the island. Looking closer, I realized that it was a large boat, probably at least forty feet, and that it was well equipped to take on the massive rolling waves of tropical storm Fay. One thing was certain, it sure as hell wasn’t the Coast Guard.

  CHAPTER

  TEN

  I flew down the spiral staircase as fast as I could, my heart racing as I tried to think about what to do next. As I reached the door, one certainty dominated my mind: we were outnumbered and outgunned. A shitty situation to be in. Back in the storm, I ran over to the house and barged in through the front door. Cynthia was in the kitchen, running water from the sink into a metal pitcher and Chris had moved to the nearby couch where his two daughters sat on either side of him, still overtaken with fear and shock.

  Shutting the door behind me, I stormed over to the couch and said, “Chris, I need you to take your wife and daughters
upstairs and into the bedroom. Now!”

  He looked up at me, his eyes wide and his swollen mouth open. “Why? What is-”

  “I need you to do it now!” I said sternly.

  Cynthia dropped the pitcher into the sink and ran over to the couch.

  “What’s going on?” she asked.

  Chris looked into my eyes and saw how serious I was. After a moment he nodded and looked at his wife. “Cynthia, please take the girls upstairs. I’ll be up in a moment.”

  She wrapped her arms around her daughters and they headed for the staircase. I turned back to Chris when the three of them were out of earshot.

  “We’re in deep shit,” I said. “There’s another boat coming this way. A big one. One that probably carries more than four fucking goons.” He gasped as I walked to the other side of the room, crouched down and grabbed the revolver resting on the wooden floor beside the dead guy who’s body they’d moved behind a chair.

  Moving back over to Chris, I clicked it open, verifying all six rounds were still loaded, then handed it to him.

  “How are you with a gun?”

  He reached his bloody hand towards me and grabbed hold of it. “I’ve been to the range a few times.”

  I nodded then glanced at the front door and said, “If anyone comes through that door that isn’t me, you kill them, you hear me?” I could tell that he wasn’t as used to the idea of killing someone, as bad as they were, as I was. So, I tried to give him some perspective. “Remember, These guys will kill you and do far worse things to your wife and daughters if given the chance. Do not give them that chance. Do not show them mercy. Understand?”

  He nodded then grunted. “Those assholes beat the shit out of me. I can barely stand. How am I supposed to help you fight them off?”

  “Just aim at the door, alright?” I said then grabbed the AK47, which was still slung over my shoulder, and checked the magazine to make sure it was full. Seeing that it had a full thirty rounds ready to go, I jammed the mag back into the rifle and added, “I’ll try to keep them from reaching the house. But just in case.”