by Jeff Abbott
“Is Danny there?”
“No,” Redhead said.
“I’ve got a half mil in a separate account.” A pause. “But you get rid of Danny. You can have the money. But not him.”
“We can’t access the accounts without him,” Gar said.
“That’s your problem. I’ll send it when he’s done and gone, you understand? And then the rest.”
“Stoney, what the hell are you doing?” Ben said. “Holy hell—”
“I’m saving you,” Stoney said. “Now just hush, Ben.”
“And you just take our word we’ve gotten rid of him?” Redhead said after a moment’s hesitation.
“No. You bring him to me. At my dock at my house at Copano Flats. I’ll give you the money as cash when you turn over his body and my brother. His girlfriend, whatever. She’s a cop. Do whatever you think is best.”
“Hell,” Gar said.
“Stoney, for God’s sake!” Ben screamed.
“Shut up, Ben,” Stoney said.
“Leave Claudia alone. Don’t you dare hurt her,” Ben said in a low voice. “Please…”
“You could have the place swarming with cops,” Gar said.
“But I won’t,” Stoney said, “because I’ve just asked you to kill Danny for me. I have no reason to invite the cops to our meeting. Take the money and forget you ever heard of Danny, okay?”
“We’ll call you back in five,” Redhead said. “Be there.” He clicked off the phone. “Interesting turn of events.”
“She a cop?” Gar grabbed Ben’s arms, brought him off the couch.
“Screw you,” Ben said.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” Gar said.
“This could be a delaying tactic. I don’t buy that about the computers being down,” Redhead said.
“But he wants Danny dead,” Gar said. “And we get a half million as a bonus for what we’re gonna have to do anyway.”
“Play it this way. Get rid of the woman. Don’t take the risk she’s a cop,” Redhead said. His voice was cool and firm. “I’ll set up new overseas accounts for us. Then let Stoney hear Danny die. Strangle him, you’re strong enough. Make Stoney move the money then. Then we just see about whether or not he gets his brother back. Little brother might be mad about girlfriend getting offed and might talk to cops. Huh? You gonna talk, little brother?”
Ben made no answer.
“I’ll take care of the girlfriend,” Gar said. “Have a little fun first, though. I always wanted to do a cop.”
“No, you’re not,” Redhead said. His tone went peevish, hurt.
“Don’t worry. You’re my favorite. Stay here. Just watch him.”
Ben heard Gar move heavily up the steps. “Claudia!” Ben yelled. “No!”
A gun barrel jabbed hard into his testicles. “One more word,” Redhead said, “and I shoot them off.”
“You—” Ben started but he didn’t finish.
“There, you happy?” Stoney’s hands shook as he set down the phone.
“Wasn’t so hard, now, was it?” Alex sat on the corner of the desk. Pissed as hell when he got here, but then he’d calmed when Stoney explained. It made Stoney nervous.
“My brother—”
“We’ll worry about him later. First we got to make sure Danny can’t tell what all he knows. You see that now. He put two and two together, he can’t live to testify.”
“You screwed up,” Stoney said. “You should have killed him.”
“Our paths didn’t cross in New Orleans,” Alex said. “Is that my fault?”
“But my brother…” Stoney’s voice faded.
“Hey, man, you could have done what they said. Sent the money flying along the cables. You didn’t. Don’t lay this on me.” Alex stood, looked out over the bay. “They ought to be here soon, assuming they call back and all’s well.”
Stoney leaned over and vomited into a wastebasket.
“That’s nasty. Yuck.” Alex handed Stoney a tissue. “Now. Problem number two. The emerald that’s in the storage unit’s a fake, Stoney. Can you explain that to me?”
“So we gonna kill them,” Danny whispered.
“No killing anybody,” Claudia said. “Not if we don’t have to.”
“If you’re gonna chicken out if push comes to shove, I need to know right now.”
She raised one eyebrow. “Don’t worry about me.”
“Fine, then. I got a plan.”
“Let’s hear it,” she said. He had loosened the rope on her wrists a little and her hands prickled with returning sensation.
“I got chloroform on the boat, thought we might need it to subdue Stoney,” he said. “When one of ’em comes back over here, you distract him, mouth off to him, and I slap ’im with the chloroform cloth.”
“Maybe something simpler,” Claudia said. “Maybe you putting your gun at the back of his head and making him drop his gun.”
“What if he don’t surrender? What if he shoots you or me?”
“He’s not likely to do that with a gun at the base of his skull. And if you’re behind him he can’t shoot you.”
“He might shoot you,” Danny said.
“Then you need to press that gun hard against him so he knows you mean business.”
“If I shoot one, the other will hear.”
“You got a fire extinguisher here in the galley?” she asked. Danny nodded toward the cabinet under the sink. “You put the gun on him, get him to freeze, I’ll belt him in the head with the extinguisher. Knock him out.”
“That means you got to be untied.”
“Yes.”
Danny chewed his lip. Now that she could see his face clearly, study it, she didn’t like the flat shine in his eyes. Not clever but cagey.
“You begged me to trust you, you got to trust me,” Claudia said. “I can’t be much help to you tied up.”
“You punched me,” he said. “You’re the toughest little cookie in the jar. You might try to take the gun from me.”
“Well, I won’t,” Claudia said. “You can trust me. It’s your call.”
He put his gun down and loosened the ropes from around her hands. She kept her hands very still. “If I take the ropes off all the way he’ll notice.”
“I’ll tuck my hands under the table.”
“What about your blindfold?” he asked. “He’ll be suspicious if it’s off you.”
“Leave it off,” she said. “If we lose, he’ll kill me anyway.”
Danny took his Sig and got up from the galley booth.
“Do you have any other guns?” Claudia asked.
“No,” Danny said. “I’m for gun control, actually.”
“Then give me the gun.”
“You’ll shoot me,” Danny said.
Yes, I will, she decided then. But later and in the leg. “This is ridiculous. I’m not going to shoot you.”
He still seemed to think, working the inside of his cheek.
She played a cautious card. “Yes, you’re just like your hero, Laffite. Heart of a warrior. You can’t make the simplest decision.”
His eyes narrowed. “You don’t understand. I’m this close… after what all I’ve lost… I can’t lose the Devil’s Eye. Or the journal. It’s what I’ve lived for, honey.”
His stare and his sad confession made her queasy. “You gonna trust me or Gar and the redhead more?”
“I got a plan. You get down in the stateroom, lie down on the bed like you’re sleeping. He comes down there to check on you, he’s got to go down those narrow stairs. I put the gun behind his ear then, make him drop his.”
“In a stateroom there’s not much cover,” she said. “You’re nice and safe behind him and I’m not.”
“It’s just a variant on your original idea.” He sounded peeved.
“With all due respect, I don’t think you have the nerve for this.” She kept her voice calm. “I was in the army right out of school. Give me the gun and let me handle him.”
“I’m not giving you the advant
age, Claudia. If I were you I’d shoot me—maybe not kill me, because you seem like a real nice lady—then get on the radio and call for help.”
“Where’s your radio?”
“Up on the bridge.”
“It doesn’t make sense for me to shoot you and then try to call for help. Your buddies might spot me up on the deck and open fire.”
He didn’t say anything, rubbing his thumb along the Sig’s handle.
“But they won’t think anything of you being up there, Danny. Can you go up there, call the coast guard on Channel 16?” Sixteen was the regular monitoring channel, on which boats hailed each other in short order before moving their communications to another channel. A lifeline connecting all sorts of boats on the water, Channel 16 was monitored by the coast guard. “Call a Mayday, tell them it’s a kidnapping situation, request help.”
“And then I get arrested. No way.”
“You’re going to get caught anyway. My plan’s the only safe way out for you. I promise.”
Danny stared at her. “But Gar’ll have Jupiter’s radio tuned to 16. They’ll hear us. Or they’ll see me using the radio and they’ll go nuts.”
“Then call on 22A. That’s the coasties’ liaison channel. Go up there, crouch down low, and get us some help.”
He shook his head. “If they see me, they’ll kill me.”
“They’re going to kill you anyway and you’re a moron if you don’t see that.”
He suddenly—but gently—pressed the barrel underneath her chin. “Listen. You’re not the boss here.”
“If you kill me, Stoney won’t give you what you want.” She felt calmer than she could have imagined with a gun held to her head by a clearly unstable man. But his finger wasn’t on the trigger. He was playing with her and the idea of death, and she stared back at him.
“Get down to the stateroom.” Danny pulled her to her feet, gave her a little push. “Lie down like you’re sleeping or crying. My plan’ll work.”
She didn’t argue. The stateroom on Miss Catherine was tiny, the bedspread worn, smelling of Cheetos and beer, like a cheap motel room. On a side table was a stack of books. All about Jean Laffite and early Texas history, little bits of neon-colored paper sticking out from the pages like bright plumage. Clothes lay in an untidy heap on the floor. Danny prodded her with the gun, grazing the back of her head, and she clambered onto the bed, her foot throbbing.
“At least untie me so I can fight him if I have to,” she said.
He hesitated.
“So am I help or just bait?” she snapped.
“I’m deciding,” he said.
“I thought you were a gentleman.”
“Shut up.”
“No,” she said. “I won’t. You want my help, you better start helping me. Untie me. Or you’re going to have to shoot me, because I’m not cooperating with you anymore.”
He made a sigh of exasperation. “This is why they didn’t have women on ships of old.”
“You told me before I picked my friends badly. You picked yours worse. You get to pick again, at least for now.”
“Danny!” Gar’s voice rumbled from the deck.
Danny shoved her onto the bed. “Pretend. We don’t got time for your plan.” And he hurried back up the stairs. She heard the galley door smack open, heard Gar demand in a low voice, Where’s she at? heard Danny answer in a mumble that Claudia was scared, downstairs, he’d let her try to take a nap, keep her out of the way.
She tried to wriggle her hands free from the rest of the rope. The rope gouged her skin. She heard Danny saying, “I don’t think so.”
Claudia yanked her right hand free. Forget being bait. She jumped up from the bed, huddled in the closet. Wire hangers jangled above her head, tangled in her hair. She needed a weapon; she clawed the hangers free from her head.
The hanger. Make it into a loop of wire, a garrote, grab him from behind, choke the air out of him.
She grabbed one, twisted it hard, unraveling the spiral of wire at the top. Another twist. Another. Heavy footsteps pounding on the stairs, Danny screaming to wait a minute. Fists hitting flesh, hard, the unmistakable pop of knuckle against jaw.
Not enough time. She dropped the hanger, looped her hand around the length of rope hanging down from her wrist. Maybe not long enough. Nothing, she had nothing.
The stateroom door flew open, smacked against the closet door. She saw Gar, shirtless, his back a scrimshaw of gaudy tattoos, a mass of muscle moving underneath the faded inks. “You ready for—” He stopped for a second, seeing the empty bed. But she couldn’t spring out at him, the open stateroom door jamming up against the closet door.
She was trapped.
Gar glanced around, saw the sliver of her in the closet, smiled with half his mouth. “Hidin’ don’t help.”
Claudia took a step sideways in the closet. Nothing in here, nothing to help her. Her fear tasted like smoke in her mouth.
“Change of plan, Officer. But you’ll like it.” Gar slid the closet door open, grabbed Claudia by the hair, yanked her out of the dark narrow space. Shoved her to the bed. His pale chest looked wide as a door, his arms like pile drivers. She wriggled away from him. “You don’t fight me, you make it nice, I’ll protect you from my boy. He’s not gonna be happy, you gettin’ what he likes. Oh, no. He might cut your eyes out when we’re done. So you be a good girl and be nice and I’ll—”
Claudia punched him, hard, across the jaw. He blinked, frowned, and blood welled up in the corner of his mouth. He cussed and backhanded her, the knuckles of his hand like rocks against her jaw. Little black flowers blossomed in front of her; he held down her throat, pressed his weight into her legs.
“I’m gonna work all the fight out of you, honey.” He grabbed her head and started pulling her up from the bed when the shot rang and she heard a sound like a hard thump on a melon. Blood exploded from Gar’s nose, his mouth, spraying Claudia. She screamed. He fell on her, and she kicked out from under him, wriggling along the headboard, tumbling to the floor off the bed.
Danny kept the gun pressed to the back of Gar’s head. He stared at Claudia.
“Oh,” he said. “Oh. That’s done.” Then he grinned at her, proud of himself, the dragon slayer. “Are you all right?”
Her vocal cords turned to ice. “You killed him.”
Danny pulled the gun away from the blasted back of Gar’s head. “Sure I did.” Danny seemed to not quite believe his new tough-guy status, staring at Gar, as though the big man’s shoulders would suddenly hitch with breath.
She stood, her jaw aching, her foot hurting from the broken toe. “The redhead will come. Or maybe he heard the shot.” He’ll kill Ben.
Danny turned the gun toward her. “You could at least thank me.”
“Thank you,” she said. “Don’t shoot me.”
He tilted his head at her and she didn’t like the dead, flat look in his eyes. No shuddering shakes over having just killed a man. The fact was done, filed, out of mind.
“I won’t leave Ben at his mercy,” she said. She moved toward the door; he followed her with the gun.
“Stop, Claudia.”
She stopped.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“I’m going to radio for help.”
She expected him to argue with her, order her to stop, but there was only the silence of the waves brushing the hulls of the boats. Then the rev of an engine. Not theirs. Jupiter’s.
“Oh, no,” Claudia said.
“Stay,” Danny said.
She heard Jupiter’s motor rev again, and Miss Catherine swayed.
“If we’re still roped to them…” she started and he lowered the gun.
She ran up the stairs, through the galley, and peered through the galley door’s window out onto the deck. Jupiter was free from them, the lines cut. Gunning away from them. She could see Redhead in the flying bridge, hunkered down low, steering.
“He’s running, he’s taking Ben,” she said.
Claud
ia turned to face Danny and the foam hit the side of her face hard, cold and sharp, and pain knocked her down with an iron slap. She moaned, then liquid dribbled onto her face, smelling of stale air and medicine, and she was gone.
16
DINNER WAS THE “Vengeance Is Ours” special: grilled hammerhead, with little plastic cups of melted butter for dipping, drippy corn on the cob, and French fries thick as a finger. Whit Mosley and David Power sat in the canopied shade of the oaks bending over Stubby’s. The food was excellent but the locale was not gourmet; rather, Stubby’s was a trailer, with a walkup window and a barbecue in the back that offered up pork ribs and brisket, except this morning Stubby’s son snagged a hammerhead on the edge of St. Leo Bay and the unlucky shark debuted on today’s menu. The tables were old cable spools, upended, each one surrounded by stumps weathered smooth from the rubbing of a thousand butts. Clouds filled the evening sky and it was still too warm and sticky for comfortable outside eating, but David wanted Stubby’s. Plus fewer people meant it was less likely they would be overheard.
David bit into his shark, which made Whit think it was truly a dog-eat-dog world.
“Let’s get one thing clear. I’m not gunning for Lucy because you’re involved with her. You could give me some credit. I can’t not consider Lucy. You understand that.”
“But you do have this other suspect. Jimmy Bird.”
“How’d you know?”
“His wife hates your guts. She called me. I called Hollis about it. She got an idea that Jimmy ran off to New Orleans.” Let him talk to Sheriff Hollis about it, Whit decided.
“Well, why didn’t you tell me?”
“You were too busy telling me about Lucy,” he said. “And Mrs. Bird asked me not to talk to you.”
“She’s just a drunk.”
“I got an anonymous tip today.”
David lowered his corn, butter dripping from his mouth. “Aren’t you popular?”
“I heard Patch Gilbert asked around town about quietly raising a hundred thousand dollars.”
“For what?”
“That I don’t know.”
“I assume the tip didn’t come from a loan officer at a bank?”
“No. Hence the anonymous,” Whit said with a thin smile. “But don’t you think it would be wise to check Patch’s finances? Maybe see if he owed debts, gambling, I don’t know what, but this had to be big.”
