by David DeLee
“Kayla, you need to get into position, now,” he snapped. “This op just went sideways.”
-----
Benjiro and Kin Sanu stood by the elevator. Benjiro tapping at the call button. He tapped at it several times, impatient. Behind them, Tara slipped off her spiked heels and ran for the door marked stairs at the far end of the passageway.
She slipped through the door, giving a last look toward the casino manager and Kin to make sure the elevator hadn’t arrived yet. It had not. She eased the door closed and rushed down the stairwell to the lower deck.
Before entering into the passageway outside the Vault, Tara lifted her dress and pulled the Sig from its thigh holster. She eased the door open and entered the passageway. The wreckage she walked through caused her hear to skip a beat.
In equal parts disbelief and awe, she said, “Damn, Skyjack.”
A large Asian man laid on the floor, his back against the wrecked bulkhead. He groaned and lolled his head, alive but still out of it. His suit was bloody and torn. More blood coated his mouth and chin, a trail of red leaked from one eye like a tear. Broken glass littered the carpet.
Tara found the source of the broken glass and the cause of the malfunctioning elevator.
Like the Wicked Witch of the East, when Dorothy’s house landed on top of her in the Wizard of Oz, a pair of legs extended out from under the elevator car, which rested at an odd angle wedged inside its shaft.
On a positive note, she could tell they didn’t belong to McMurphy.
She heard footsteps coming down the stairwell behind her. Benjiro and Kin must have tired of waiting for the elevator. Still carrying her shoes by the straps, Tara slipped further down the passageway, away from the carnage, careful to not cut her feet on the glass. No point in being caught down there and blowing her cover if McMurphy wasn’t in need of her help.
She wondered where he could be.
Benjiro and Kin emerged from the stairwell. The manager sucked in a breath. Kin remained silent, which made Tara realize; she’d yet to hear either of the twins actually speak. They moved forward to investigate, and possibly revive the man McMurphy left alive.
Tara took the opportunity to slip around behind them and return to the stairwell. She’d only just eased the door closed and made it halfway up the stairs when the door below her open up again.
Caught halfway to the upper landing, she stopped to look down.
Kin Sanu stood at the door, holding it open. He stared up at her.
She flashed a weak smile. “Oh, Hey. Hi, there.”
The bodyguard didn’t speak but his expression told her he was looking for an explanation.
“I was, um, looking for the ladies’ room,” she said.
His expression, including his narrow, angry looking eyes, said he wasn’t buying it.
“The one up here. It’s flooded. Smells like a sewer in there.” She held up her spiked heels. “Got my pumps all wet. Now they smell like—”
He charged up the steps. Two at a time. When he reached her, he took her by the arm. He squeezed.
She protested. “Hey!”
She grabbed the handrailing as he tried to pull her away. He redoubled his effort. Tara responded with a bare footed kick to his chest.
The twin staggered back. Surprised by the attack. He took a step down and missed the lower step. He started to fall backward, but rather than fall, instead he executed an impressive backflip and landed on the lower landing, gracefully touching down. His toes, one knee, and sprayed fingers keeping him perfectly balanced.
He stared daggers back up at Tara.
This isn’t going as planned, Tara thought. The bodyguard raced up the steps after her. Could she salvage her cover after this? She didn’t see how unless she allowed…
No, she thought. Enough was enough.
She backed up and tossed her pumps to the corner. She planted her feet in a backward weighted stance and raised her arms in defense. Kin Sanu reached the landing and took a more aggressive forward weighted stance, as Tara had anticipated.
Let’s see what you’ve got, she thought as he launched into his attack. A blitzkrieg flurry of flying arms and legs. His technique was good, but his kicks and punches were rushed.
Tara leaned back. She blocked his swinging arms, slapping them away faster than he could throw them. She twisted, avoiding a side kick aimed at crippling her knee, but she didn’t avoid a slap to the face that sent her back a step.
She went on the offensive.
She slapped away his blocks and drove him back across the small landing. He backpedaled. She leaped and snapped a kick into his gut. That sent him reeling. She landed on the floor, spun, and lashed out with a second kick. That knocked his swinging arm to the side. She followed up with a straight punch to his eye.
He backed into the wall, shook his head.
Tara backed away.
Like two dancers, they went back and forth across the landing. She landed as many blows as he did. Every strike, every blow, hurt. Sanu charged again, this time Tara ducked. As he flew over her, she stood up, throwing his legs into the air so his body flipped. He landed on his back on the floor. The air rushed from his lungs.
Tara spun and savaged his head with several punches.
Sanu moved his head too fast for Tara to arrest a punch she’d thrown. Her fist smashed into the concrete. It tore her skin, leaving a smear of blood. She cried out in pain. “Okay, that hurt.”
Sanu rolled away, sprang to his feet.
Her wrist throbbing, her knuckles raw with pain, Tara stood and spun. She jumped and lashed out with a side kick at the ninja’s head. He blocked it with his arm, but the force of it sent him flying down the flight of stairs.
Tara landed on the balls of her feet and watched as Sanu twisted in the air. His fall down the steps turned into a balanced gymnastics routine as he stretched his arms out, landed on the step in a hand stand position, then, using his momentum, sprang back into the air, arcing his body toward the lower landing where he landed on his feet, unscathed and in a perfectly balanced defensive position.
Tara, looking down the stairs at him. “Got to say, that was impressive.”
Sanu ignored her compliment. Instead, he grabbed the front of his shirt and the lapels of his jacket and tore them open, ripping the clothes from his torso. Like his oyabun, his lithe body was covered in colorful tattoos from under his neck, over his entire upper body, and down both arms to his wrists.
Rather than engage him again, Tara said, “Well, this has been fun. But we’ll have to pick it up another time.”
She charged up the remaining stairs to the main deck. She needed to get to Bannon. Unless she was mistaken, it was time to abandon ship.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
McMurphy left the passageway, moved down a corridor that ran behind the wrecked elevator toward the front of the yacht. He went through a door at the end that took him to the small crew cabins under the Bakuto’s forward deck. There he found the stairwell that led to the upper deck.
The original plan had been to clear out the safe and for him to slip off the yacht undetected, perhaps to not even be noticed missing until the Bakuto again reached port.
Best laid plans, he groused, sure his attackers would be found very soon, if not already.
Back at the Keel Haul, McMurphy had argued should the plan go sideways he wouldn’t leave Bannon and Tara behind on the Bakuto. He wouldn’t abandon them. Bannon counter argued, the mission came first. They’d gone round and round on the issue, but Bannon had the final say. “If you get away with the flash drive, and things go bad for us, you can use it as a bargaining chip. If you get caught stealing it or trying to rescue us, we’ll all end up dead.”
Tara boiled it down in her usual snarky way. “Just don’t mess it up, Skyjack. Then it won’t be an issue.”
McMurphy adjusted the backpack on his back and cursed.
He climbed to the top of the stairs still thinking he should go get them, unable to shake the feeling
he was letting them down. But his military training told him, Bannon was right. The mission came first. They’re best chance came from his successful escape.
With the Sugiura pistol in hand, McMurphy stepped out onto the bow deck, forward of the upper and sun deck levels, open to the surrounding seas. Prepared to shoot his way out of trouble, he found the deck empty.
Relieved, he smiled when he caught sight of his means of escape from the Bakuto. “Come to papa, baby,” he said. “Come to papa.”
A military-grade, rigid hull, inflatable lifeboat. It was thirteen feet long with a five foot beam, had a six person capacity, a deep-V fiberglass hull, and was made out of a 40-ounce polyurethane tube, making it both lightweight and durable. Outfitted with a seventy horsepower Evinrude outboard motor, the boat could reach a speed of twenty-seven knots.
McMurphy eyed the RHIB the way a wolf eyed a lamb.
It sat slightly elevated off the deck in a tubular cradle. Designed to be launched by two, with one person inside the RHIB and another on the deck to operate the cradle assembly and winch. It would be tricky for McMurphy to do it alone.
“But tricky’s my middle name.” He shrugged his shoulders to adjust the weight of the backpack and ignored the achy muscles and his sore ribs from his recent fight. “Let’s do this.”
The cradle was a standard hydraulic assembly. No lockouts or obvious security protocols to prevent its operation. McMurphy saw nothing he couldn’t handle. He inspected the watercraft as he moved around it, releasing the tie downs. Everything appeared to be in good working order.
He activated the cradle control, lifting the RHIB to a height above the Bakuto’s railings. Using the lever, he extended the arm outward, moving the small craft out beyond the V-shaped point of the bow. The mechanism whined loudly and seemed to operate in slow motion.
McMurphy knew that was simply his nerves. Still he continually threw glances over his shoulder, expecting to see armed Yakuza enforcers charging through the hatch from the lower decks at any moment.
But so far nothing.
When the arm had extended the RHIB out over the Bakuto’s railing to its farthest reach, McMurphy climbed the forward rail. “Now for the tricky part.”
He’d have to leap the distance between the Bakuto and the RHIB.
It wasn’t that far, he tried to convince himself, as he balanced on the railing like a kid playing on the monkey bars at school. The Bakuto was at anchor and the seas were calm, which helped.
He looked down. The black water shimmered with burst of reflective moonlight on its gentle waves. The soft wind was chilly but not particularly strong. No reason a quick hop over to the swaying RHIB should be anything but a breeze.
Of course, that’s when the shooting started.
A round pinged off the railing near where McMurphy gripped it tightly. Surprised, he snapped his hand back, teetering dangerous on the rail. He looked behind him to see two Asian men dart from the stairwell and take up covering positions behind the outdoor bar and a stack of chaise lounges.
Guns drawn, they fired again.
Out of time, McMurphy leaped and miscalculated his jump.
He hadn’t pushed far enough off the railing. His dress shoes slipped along the wet metal rail. He fell short of his intended target, the wide bench seat in the middle of the lifeboat.
He stretched his arms out. His fingers hit but slipped off the polyurethane side of the RHIB.
Bullets zinged around him.
Sliding off the side of the lifeboat, he clawed for and caught hold of one of the metal tubes that made up the cradle holding the craft, arresting his plunge into the water. With one fist tightly gripping the tube he swung his other arm up and around, hooking it around the tube.
He hung, dangling over the cold Atlantic water below.
His heart thumped in his chest. His ribs felt like they were on fire as he tried to haul himself up into the cradle. The weight of the backpack dragged him back but he managed to swing a foot up, hook it over a cradle tube, then pull himself up.
Gunfire exploded around him.
Bullets chipped at the metal cradle, sparking and ricocheting dangerously around him.
A bullet hit his backpack.
McMurphy winced, waiting for the telltale pain that would come from a bullet wound, but he didn’t feel it. He breathed a sigh of relief and did his best to ignore the gunfire as he scrambled fully into the cradle. That done, he leaped up and tumbled over the polyurethane side into the well of the RHIB.
The backpack took a second bullet.
McMurphy scrambled around the well of the boat, climbing to his knees. He drew the little Japanese gun from his waistband and returned fire at the two men doing their best to kill him.
He only needed to brush them back, just long enough so he could get to the Sampson post.
If he killed them in the process, so be it.
He reached the post and disconnected the winch line and the cradle straps. He hit the remote quick release button on the cradle. The claw-like armatures grasping the lifeboat snapped open and the RHIB was in sudden freefall.
As the craft dropped, McMurphy watched the faces of the gunman watching him. Their jaws dropping along with the boat. He shouted, “Yippie-ki-yay—”
The RHIB hit the water with a splash. Knocked off his feet, McMurphy tumbled into the polyurethane tube gunwale. He grabbed a cleat and pulled his way to the stern. There he fired up the seventy horsepower Evinrude outboard motor. It roared to life, spewing blue smoke and churning the dark water into a froth of bubbly white foam.
With its bow riding high, the RHIB sped away from the Bakuto.
McMurphy waved at the gunmen still shooting at him, gunning the engine, getting out of their kill zone as quickly as he could. He sped away, putting the anchored Bakuto behind him, until it was a bright but small spot of light on an otherwise black sea.
He’d succeeded in cleaning out Kwon’s safe, but at what cost? A yakuza goon was dead and he was running away, abandoning the two most important people in his life. McMurphy never felt more like a coward in his entire life.
It wouldn’t take long for Kwon to piece together what he’d done. When he did, Bannon and Tara would be at his mercy. His friends were the most capable people he knew, but Kwon’s penchant for violence was legendary.
McMurphy slapped at the RHIB’s wheel and gunned the throttle forward. “Son of a bitch.”
-----
By the time Tara raced back to the stateroom—without her shoes—the gunfire from the yacht’s bow had begun. Things were going to hell fast. She rushed in, coming around the back of the stairs.
They needed to get of the yacht fast.
As she burst into the stateroom where she’d left Bannon and Kwon arguing over who’d been cheating at Oicho-Kabu, she stopped short. They were still there, but no longer near the Oicho-Kabu table. They’d moved to the middle of the room. Kyo Sanu held Bannon with his arms pinned behind his back. Kwon had put his shirt and tuxedo jacket back on, though both hung open and unbuttoned.
He held a South Korean manufactured 9mm pistol pointed at Bannon’s forehead.
This was definitely not part of the plan.
The others who’d been in the room when she left were gathered in one corner, along with the two Japanese waitresses, the dealer, and the bartender. Two dark suited Asian men held them at bay with handguns of their own.
Kwon glanced at her. “Welcome back, Ms. Sardana.”
She thought about making a run for it, escape, hide, regroup while she planned a rescue. But to what end? Where would she go? If she did make a break for it, what would Kwon do? Retaliate immediately, kill Bannon straight away?
“What’s going on?” she asked innocently.
Before Kwon could speak, from behind her, a fist roughly grabbed her hair and yanked her head back. She glanced to the side, confirming it was her new, best friend Kin Sanu.
He remained shirtless, his irezumi on full display. He snarled in her ear, a guttural soun
d, before pulling her deeper into the room. He shoved her toward Bannon, his twin, and Kwon.
Noticing the bodyguard was stripped to his waist, Kwon asked, “What happened to you?”
Bannon smirked at the man’s swollen eye.
“Are you all right?” he asked Tara.
“Swell. You?”
“Fine,” Bannon said. “But something tells me I won’t be keeping my winnings.”
“Why are you doing this?” Tara demanded of Kwon. “What have we done?”
Before he could answer, Benjiro burst into the room, breathless. “Taro has been severely beaten. He is still unconscious. Jabal is dead.”
“The gunfire we heard?” Kwon asked.
“The elevator.”
Noting his boss’ confused expression, he said, “It crushed him.”
“What is going on?” Kwon demanded.
“The vault,” Benjiro said. “It’s been compromised. We were alerted of an unauthorized entry in the security room.”
Damn it, Tara thought. The motion detectors didn’t just activate the lights. They alerted security. Benjiro must have dispatched the goons McMurphy had dealt with.
“Compromised!” Kwon exclaimed. “How?”
Benjiro stammered. “The safe. He was in the safe.”
“My safe?” Kwon dismissed the idea. “That’s impossible.”
“I saw it with my own eyes,” Benjiro insisted. “On the surveillance video.”
“How? Never mind? It was McMurphy, wasn’t it?” Kwon pressed the 9mm against Bannon’s temple. “His friend.”
“Yes,” Benjiro said.
“Where is he now?”
“Our security men encountered him attempting to flee the Bakuto.”
“They have him?”
Benjiro shook his head, afraid to answer. “No. he fled the ship. Stole a lifeboat and escaped.”
“McMurphy did this!” Kwon raged. He pressed the gun harder to Bannon’s forehead. Bannon winced. “This is you’re doing. You’re part of this.”
