Hunted in the Keys

by Matthew Rief

  Strolling up alongside his goons, he eyed me from head to toe as he took a deep inhalation of his cigar and then blew it out into my face. The smoke stung my eyes a little, but I didn’t give him the satisfaction of letting it show.

  “So, this is the shithead who’s been giving us so much trouble,” he said, glancing at the three thugs standing beside him. He spoke with a powerful Cuban accent, and he sounded pissed off. “Look at him,” he continued, pointing a shrill finger at me as he moved his head to look from one thug to the other. “This is the guy you call a demon. He’s just a fucking man.” Taking a step towards me, he hit me with a hard right, his two gold rings slamming into my jaw. As I grunted and gritted my teeth he added, “Just flesh and bones.” He took a long drag of his cigar then exhaled the smoke and continued, “Who sent you to protect them? FBI? CIA?”

  “No one,” I said, then spat out a gob of gooey mess that had built up in my mouth from breathing in the tear gas.

  “No one?” he said, moving closer to me. Then, grabbing me forcefully by my shirt collar, he shook me violently and said, “You expect me to fucking believe that?”

  I stared through the dark lenses of his sunglasses and replied, “It’s true. I was trying to escape the storm when I heard gunshots.”

  “Oh, you just heard gunshots?” he said sarcastically while shaking his head. He gave a sinister laugh and added, “You’ve killed forty-four of my men since yesterday morning. Hale is useless. I saw the beating he got on camera yesterday. That means that you did it all alone. Like fucking hell nobody sent you.”

  “I wasn’t alone,” I said. “Chris’ wife killed a few of your thugs.” It was a slight exaggeration, but though she wasn’t exactly Beatrix Kiddo, she had saved my life earlier that morning when she shot that thug in the head with her Beretta. “And,” I continued, “I had a constant supply of firearms and other weapons. I guess I have you to thank for that, Salazar.”

  He wiped the smug smile from my face with another hard punch, this time to my right cheek. Pain screamed from my face and I could almost feel the rage radiating from the gang leader’s body.

  “Well, you have failed them,” he growled. “You were destined to fail the moment you fucked with me. I always get my way. You’ve got balls, I’ll give you that. And you must be highly trained to have protected them all by yourself for so long. But I will have my way. Not even a maximum-security prison could keep me contained. You have fought hard, but in the end, you see, I always get my way. I will kill Christian, just like I killed that fat ass judge. And as I swore to him as I was being dragged in chains to rot away for life in that cage, I will kill his wife and daughters as well.”

  The sound of radio chatter broke the silence that followed Salazar’s evil and resolute declaration. One of the big thugs hovering over the side of me reached for a black radio that was clipped to the fancy leather belt looped into his dress pants.

  Grabbing it, he listened a moment to words that I couldn’t hear then turned to Salazar and said, “There are transmissions.” His eyes were wide as he listened for a few seconds more then added, “They’re sending two Coast Guard patrols this way. The American Navy base in Key West is also taking action.” He held the radio out to Salazar, his hand shaking. “How are we gonna get out of this, boss?”

  I wasn’t surprised. I estimated that it had been at least forty minutes since the Coast Guard helicopter went down. Even if the pilots weren’t able to get a distress signal out as it crashed to a fiery grave, it wouldn’t have taken long for air traffic controllers at both the Coast Guard station in Key West as well as the Naval station to realize that something was wrong. At a little over sixty miles away, I reasoned that Coast Guard patrols from Key West could probably reach Loggerhead in just over an hour, meaning that they would be there soon.

  Snatching the radio from the big thug’s hand, Salazar threw it over the side. The sounds of voices coming through the small speaker grew fainter then went silent as the radio flew out of view, splashing into the water below.

  “I don’t give a damn who’s coming,” Salazar snarled. “We’ll be back in Cuba in less than half an hour. And once we’re there, we’re home free. I already have a secure landing zone with full air support ready for us along with a private jet ready to take us anywhere in the world.”

  Salazar strode nonchalantly towards the railing beside me. Then, taking one final drag of his cigar, he threw it over the side. Placing a hand on my shoulder, he lifted his sunglasses and stared at me with his dark, brown eyes. “He who has the money has the power,” he said.

  Then he shot me an evil smile and moved over to one of the barrels of fuel latched to the railing. Grabbing it with two strong arms, he dragged it towards the center of the ship then ripped off the plug. Pushing the top of the barrel, he knocked it over, sending fuel splashing to the deck and pooling near the center of the ship as it emptied. Glancing up at his three thugs, Salazar yelled at them, ordering them to empty the rest of the barrels as well. The three thugs jumped into action, grabbing the other barrels one by one and drenching the entire deck with the highly flammable liquid. The strong, potent stench of the fuel hurt my nostrils, replacing the fresh, sea air of the Caribbean.

  As Salazar moved back towards my position against the starboard railing, he looked at the crazy looking thug with the shotgun and said, “Start up the chopper, Steven.” The guy nodded then turned on his heels and ran towards the metal stairs.

  Standing in front of me, Salazar looked at the big thug to his right and held out his hand. “Give me his weapons.”

  Without hesitation, the thug produced my Sig and dive knife from the back of his pants and handed them to Salazar. Salazar immediately took a step closer to me and then pulled back the hammer on my Sig, making it easier to pull the trigger. A moment later, he pointed the barrel at my head. This is it, I thought as he gave me a crooked, evil smile. I had to do something, but with my wrists latched behind my back and my ankles latched together I knew that there was nothing I could do. I could barely move my body, let alone try and take him out before he pulled the trigger.

  Tilting his head, he lowered my Sig then stashed it in the back of his pants. “No,” he said, “I’m not going to kill you.”

  Grabbing my dive knife, he held it up in front of me, its sharpened steel edge glistening in the bright, tropical sun. In an instant, he wrapped a hand around my back and pulled me towards him. With my momentum forcing me closer to him, he stabbed the tip of my knife deep into my abdomen, the blade slicing far into the lower part of my rib cage. I gasped and grunted in pain as the blade pierced through me.

  Grabbing me forcefully, Salazar brought his mouth close to my left ear and said, “No. Why get my hands dirty when I can let mother nature take care of you?”

  As the words came out of his mouth, he ripped out my blade and stepped away from the railing. The two big thugs closed in on me, grabbing me on both sides and lifting me up to the top of the rail. I caught a glimpse of Salazar as he dug a Zippo out of the front pocket of his dress pants and flicked a flame alive. My body reaching the top of the railing, the two thugs hurled me over the side. I flew backward, twisting and spinning wildly as the bright sky and ocean blurred in and out of view. In the heat of the moment and a fraction of a second before breaking the surface, I forced a gulp of air deep into my lungs.

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-THREE

  I splashed into the warm, Caribbean water head first, my body spinning and sinking about five feet under before the drag of the water slowed me to a stop. Keeping myself as calm as possible, I opened my eyes, squinting and feeling the slight sting as they adjusted themselves. Blood flowed out from my chest and glancing down, I saw a deep gash where Salazar had stabbed me on the right side of my abdomen. I fought back the pain and took a second to think of a plan. Looking up, I saw the surface just a few kicks above me but knew that it would be a waste of time to surface. Even if I managed to somehow get back onto the ship, Salazar or one of his thugs wo
uld riddle me with bullets just as I reached the deck. Feeling the thick plastic of the zip ties cutting off the circulation in my ankles and wrists, I knew I had to find a way to break free before doing anything else.

  I drew my gaze down towards the seafloor and spotted patches of elkhorn and brain coral about ten feet below me. Shifting my upper body down and my legs back, I kicked as best as I could, slithering my body through the water. The pain in my side was almost unbearable as I forced my body to propel itself down. A thick stream of dark red trailed behind me, branching out and dissipating into the ocean. A shark can detect even the smallest amounts of blood in the water, and if there happened to be one close by that decided to attack me while my arms and legs were restrained, I’d have no way to fight it off.

  Upon reaching the bottom, I equalized my ears to the pressure, then found a large growth of pillar coral rising up from the reef about twenty feet away from me. Pillar coral is a hard coral that resembles fat fingers growing up from the seafloor. That particular coral was beige and rose up about seven feet from the sand below. Having cut myself a few times swimming a little too close to hard coral in my life, I knew first hand just how sharp it could be. Swimming up close to one of the outlying pillars, I extended my hands as far back behind me as they could go then pulled my hands away from one another and pressed the plastic zip tie against its sharp ridges. Bending my elbows, I seesawed the plastic up and down, scraping it forcefully against the razor-sharp coral. The commotion spooked what looked like a decent sized Pompano fish out of its hiding place, causing it to skirt past me, its silver body sparkling in the sun. After a few seconds, I felt the plastic start to crack and then it snapped in an instant, causing my hands to fly out to my sides.

  With my hands free I grabbed hold of the coral carefully and went to work on the zip tie holding my ankles together. As the plastic snapped, freeing my legs, I looked up towards the surface for the first time in about a minute and a half. Near the hull of the ship there was a dark red cloud spreading out in all directions. With my vision blurred I couldn’t tell what it was, but Salazar’s thugs had thrown a bloodied piece of animal flesh into the ocean, just in case my bleeding chest wasn’t enough to attract every shark for miles.

  Knowing I had to do something to try and slow the amount blood I was losing, I slipped my tee shirt over my head and tied it around my abdomen. It wasn’t ideal by any means, but it slowed the bleeding. Taking a moment to look around the seafloor and at the anchored ship above, I quickly got my bearings and used what remained of the air in my lungs to swim towards Loggerhead. I’d already been down for at least three minutes, but I wanted to put as much distance between myself and the ship as possible.

  After I’d kicked my way over the reef about a hundred feet from the ship, I glanced up and saw the black inflatable boat drifting lifelessly, the current taking it south. As I swam up closer I realized that it been deflated, no doubt by Salazar’s thugs. But even with it destroyed, I knew it could still help me. As fast as I could I rose up out of the water, crawled over the loose flaps of rubber, grabbed the AK47 then took a deep breath and vanished back beneath the surface.

  Kicking my feet and stroking with my left arm, I swam back down to the bottom and kept moving towards the shore. It felt good to at least have a weapon in my hands but that feeling was short lived as I spotted shark swimming my direction from the southwest. I couldn’t tell what kind it was since my vision was so blurred from not wearing a dive mask but judging by the way it moved towards me, it was looking to feed.

  With my body a painful wreck and my side hurting so bad I could barely move, I forced myself to keep kicking and stroking my arms, propelling myself through the water as fast as I could towards the shore. My lungs throbbing for air, I forced myself up towards the surface, having spent what felt like an eternity beneath the waves. Barely breaking the surface, I sucked in a quick lungful of air and took a brief look around before dropping right back down. Behind me, the entire deck of the ship was going up in flames, sending thick, black clouds of smoke into the air. Overhead, I heard the distinct sound of Salazar’s helicopter as it roared towards the center of Loggerhead, knowing full well what he was going to do when he found Chris and his family. Unable to get their faces out of my mind, I forced myself to move faster, pulling my arms through the water with strong, methodical strokes and scissor kicking my legs back and forth.

  I kept myself about five feet from the surface and when I was halfway between the ship and the white, sandy beach of Loggerhead, I spotted another shark circling around me. The trail of blood continued to flow out of my side even with my shirt tightened against it, making me wonder how much I’d lost. It made me dizzy just thinking about it, so I threw it out of my mind and kept moving, keeping a watchful eye on the two sharks, making sure neither of them had decided to come at me.

  A few seconds later, one of the sharks swam straight for me and then veered off once he’d reached about ten feet away. Seeing it closer, it was clear that it was a tiger shark, an aggressive shark that can grow up to fifteen feet long and is second only to great whites in its number of recorded attacks on humans. Glancing ahead of me, I knew that I still had a quarter of a mile to swim before I’d reach land. There was no way a grown tiger shark would let a bleeding creature swim that far without making a move.

  Keeping my head on a swivel, I watched the two sharks attentively, preparing myself for their next pass at me. What pissed me off the most was that I liked sharks. I’d been diving with tiger, great white and bull sharks hundreds of times before and had never been attacked. In truth, I’d always thought that sharks were badass and greatly misunderstood creatures. But I knew that with blood in the water it was a different story. Even a friendly shark could become like a rabid dog and come after you in the blink of an eye upon getting a whiff of fresh blood.

  Drawing my blurry gaze on the largest of the two sharks, I slowed to a stop, watching eagerly as it kicked its tail fin, swimming straight for me. The most important thing is to remain calm, so I forced myself to be as relaxed as possible as the shark moved in. When it was within a few feet of me, its jaws sprang open, revealing rows of sharp, white teeth. Not wanting to severely hurt the animal, I slugged it in the nose with the butt of my AK47 just as it was about to find out what my thigh tasted like. The massive predator freaked out and darted away from me as fast as it could. The other circling tiger shark, seeing his buddy get his ass handed to him, kept his distance and only swam towards me a couple of times as I turned and kicked for the shore. But he never swam in close enough to strike.

  By the time I reached the shore, my body was an aching and exhausted wreck. I’d lost so much blood that my mind was delirious and my body tried desperately to go into shock. But I sure as hell wasn’t gonna stop. I’d pushed myself beyond my limits but I had to push a little bit more if I was going to save Chris and his family. It’s in the moments of sheer pain and exhaustion, when your body screams at you that it can’t go on anymore, that you find out what you’re really made of. You realize that you’re capable of more than you’d ever believed yourself capable of before. You realize that there’s another level when you push, breaking through the self-generated barriers and limitations of your existence. Gritting my teeth and heaving my body through the surf, I forced my way through those barriers, punching through them like I was going for a knockout in the twelfth round.

  As I stepped out of the ocean, lumbering through the fine, white sand, I heard the sounds of the helicopter, it’s rotor rattling through the air. Hoping that I wasn’t already too late, I picked up the pace as much as my body would allow. As I moved past the shrub line, I saw the top of the helicopter as it idled on the clearing beside the lighthouse. All I could think about were their faces, all four of them and how they needed me right then. I planned for the worst, expecting the helicopter to take off and fly high into the sky at any moment, leaving me to do nothing but watch as the family I’d struggled so hard to protect flew off to their certain deaths.


  Large drops of water and blood dripped down from my shorts and tee shirt, splattering across the sand as I kept my body low, moving in towards the helicopter while keeping my head on a swivel and my eyes peeled for Salazar and his thugs. I gripped the black AK47 firmly in my wet hands, aiming it forward as I trudged over a small sand dune covered in shrubs. I forced my legs to keep working and soon I was within a few hundred feet of the base of the lighthouse and the helicopter idling just behind it. To my surprise, the old, white house was still burning, though the flames had dwindled to just a few small piles of dark rubble.

  As I crouched behind the lighthouse for cover, I heard voices coming from the direction of the helicopter. Stepping my way around the round base, I spotted one of the big thugs and watched as he reached for the side door, grabbed the handle and slid it open forcefully. Moving another step around the base of the lighthouse, I saw the two other thugs, along with Salazar, and they were forcing Chris and his family towards the helicopter as their hands were pressed against the back of their heads. Looking closer, I realized that their hands were zip-tied the same way mine had been before Salazar stabbed me and threw me overboard to die.

  I inched my way around the corner then knelt down and pressed the butt of the AK against my shoulder, aiming at the first thug. I didn’t have a good shot. Since the helicopter was practically facing me, half of the big thug’s body was covered by the front end of it. But as Salazar led Chris and his family closer, I knew I only had a few seconds to make a move or else they’d be history. Not daring to risk the possibility of a stray bullet, I switched the AK47’s rate of fire to semi-automatic by pressing the metal switch on its side all the way down. Then putting the big thug’s head directly in my sights, I took in a deep breath and pulled the trigger.