“Okay, but it looks like it goes up.”
Townsend led the way. The tunnel went upward for thirty feet and then fell off abruptly into onto a steep downward path. At one point, both men had to hold their breath to squeeze through a crevice and slide several feet down the side of a tilted rock wall before coming to a shaft. They crawled horizontally twenty feet into another hollow in the mountain.
Townsend stood up, stretched his back, and scanned the area with his light.
“Remy was here.” Jac pointed at a fresh gouge on the ground. “These footprints show they pushed that rock over the opening we couldn’t get through.”
“We’re still in the hunt,” Townsend said.
“Do you hear it? Jac whispered. “It sounds like surf breaking against rock.”
“A way out!”
Jac started down the steep incline. He couldn’t stop worrying that Remy might get to the boats and hurt the women before he and Townsend could get there.
CHAPTER 60
After sliding down the last rabbit hole, Remy and Samuel found themselves in a tubular tunnel wading through slow-moving water four feet deep. The resonance from waves crashing close by inspired confidence that they would soon be free from the bonds of their rock prison.
“Stay close, Samuel,” Remy said. He reached out and held on to Samuel’s backpack as the water rose alarmingly. He’d never learned to swim. He fought his fear to scream when the water crept up over his shoulders.
When they turned around a curve in the channel, Samuel saw it first and turned off his flashlight. “There’s light ahead!”
“It looks like it is coming in from somewhere above,” Remy said.
They made their way down the tunnel until they stood in a globe-shaped cavern. The water was moving to the right side of the cavity and down through a dark passageway. On the other side of the cavern, they saw a shelf ten feet above them where dim light streamed through an opening in the rock face giving the cave an eerie illumination.
“Get some rope out,” Remy said, “and climb up to the ledge.”
After some labor-intensive climbing, Samuel pulled Remy and the backpacks up to the shelf.
Jac slid into the water first and flashed the light down the long tunnel.
“Do you see anything that will get us out of here?” Townsend asked. He pulled out his Glock, cocked a round into the chamber, and slipped off the safety. “They can’t be far ahead of us.”
“The sound of the surf ahead is covering any other sounds.” As they rounded a curve, Jac thought he heard Remy’s voice and turned off the flashlight. “You hear that?”
“Yes,” Townsend whispered. “It’s unintelligible. There’s dim light ahead.”
“You up to an underwater swim? The current will push us.”
“Let’s go.” Townsend tucked the Glock into his belt and ducked underwater behind Jac.
They felt the turn in the current and stopped.
Townsend surfaced first. He quickly scanned three hundred and sixty degrees ready to fire, but the cavern was empty.
“Up there,” Jac said, pointing. “It’s where they went.”
They scaled the wall up to the shelf.
A minute later both men stood at the mouth of the cave.
“Over there. The foliage is bent,” Jac said. They walked out of the cave.
A sudden barrage of gunfire sent Jac and Townsend racing into the jungle toward the sound.
CHAPTER 61
The rain had stopped. The sun was setting and breaking through a curtain of gray clouds on the horizon. Peri watched the water in the dimming light. When he saw Mandrago and Michael surface, he pulled the trigger of his automatic weapon sending a barrage of bullets at the man where he stood on the Adventurer. He didn’t care anymore if the bullets hit the Adventurer. They could always repair holes.
The two men in the water ducked under the water when the man on board returned fire. Several of the bullets hit the side of the helicopter, sending the pilot, Roni, Auntie Mick, and Peri to the floor.
“Mr. Schmoond, can I talk to you for a moment?” Roni said.
“Sure. Just stay down while I check outside.” Peri saw Michael surface at the rear and Mandrago at the front of the Adventurer. The man on board was not aware of their presence. Peri said a prayer their plan would work.
“Okay, what’s up?” Peri said. He sat down next to Roni, who was sitting next to Auntie Mick holding her hand.
“I don’t know what to do,” Roni said. “I’ve been keeping a secret from Abi and Jac.”
“It can’t be that bad,” Peri said. He took her other hand in his to reassure her.
“You know that Jac was there when my brother was killed.”
“Yes, Jac told me the whole story.”
“Well … Did he also tell you that my brother and Abi were having problems?”
“Yes, and from what Jac told me it was bad.”
“I didn’t know until recently that Jac and Abi were in love and had an affair back then.”
“Yes …” Peri hesitated. “Jac has lived with guilt for many years. He told me they never meant it to happen. And they were going to tell your brother, but he was killed.”
“I believe that. I know the reason my brother was distraught. He knew about Abi and Jac, but it wasn’t about them. Reg swore me to secrecy, and I have kept silent all these years. So many times I wanted to say something to Abi, but I never have. When I saw how Jac and Abi were hurting seeing each other after all these years, I put two and two together. They were in love. I decided she needed to know, and I tried to tell her when we were tied up in the cave. But Jac came in and rescued us. I never got the chance.”
“Do you want to tell them now?”
“Yes. I know now that the secret I’ve carried all these years must be told if Jac and Abi are to have a chance at happiness.”
“Whatever it is, Roni, just go with your heart. Abi and Jac will forgive anything you do. They both love you.”
“I’ll tell you. My brother had an affair with another woman when Abi and he were married. He ended it a month before his death. But two or three weeks before his death, the woman came to him and told him she was having his child, a girl. Reg cleaned out his bank account and gave her all the money just before he was killed. He told me about it but made me promise that, under no circumstances, was I to tell Abi or anyone. She took the money and moved to California where I believe she has married.” Tears were streaming down Roni’s face.
“Oh, child,” Auntie Mick said. “You must tell them. It doesn’t matter anymore. Jac and Abi have suffered long enough. Yes, they made a mistake. Telling them this information won’t change it, but it will allow them closure.”
“Auntie Mick is right,” Peri said. “Tell them. Abi was never able to understand why Reg treated her the way he did. She thinks it was because of her affair with Jac, but it wasn’t. They need to know. Closure for both of them is important. Any obligation for you to keep this a secret died when your brother died.” Peri squeezed her hand as she turned toward him. He took her in his arms and hugged her like a father would hug his daughter.
Suddenly two shots rang out.
Peri ran to the side door of the helicopter. The helicopter had drifted to within eighty yards of the Adventurer. Mandrago and Michael waved when they saw Peri, and immediately went to work hauling the anchors up and moving the Adventurer to safety.
CHAPTER 62
Visibility was diminishing. The sky had turned dark gray.
Remy and Samuel crawled up and peered out from behind a bush at the beach where two policemen stood with Jac Kidd’s partner near the two Zodiacs. The Adventurer had been moved to a perpendicular position closer to shore. There were two men on board. His man no longer had possession of the boat. The helicopter was on the beach. His plan became clear when he heard the engine
of the helicopter whine.
Then he watched as Chauncey, followed by Abi, climb through the door of the helicopter. They hugged an older woman at the doorway. Then they hugged the woman who had stuck a gun in his face back in Virginia. Four women on board and one pilot, Remy thought. The rotors on the helicopter started turning, and the engine whined, spit twice, but didn’t start. A few minutes passed and the rotors turned again, and this time the engine started.
“That is our opportunity to escape,” Remy whispered as they inched their way closer to the machine. “When I say go, we jump aboard the helicopter.
“Go!”
Samuel jumped on board first and startled the women who were kneeling next to a body on the floor. He prodded them with his weapon.
“Carefully slide your weapons across the floor and turn over on your stomachs,” Samuel said. “Now put your hands behind your backs so I can see ’em.”
“They saw us,” Remy said. He fired a salvo from his automatic toward two uniformed men and Jac’s partner, who were running toward the helicopter. Then he bolted into the cockpit and placed his 9 mm Glock at the pilot’s head. “Get us up now or your dead!”
Jac and Townsend saw Peri and Townsend’s two officers jump behind a sand berm when Remy fired at them from the helicopter. When he didn’t see Abi and Chauncey, Jac knew they were aboard the helicopter. If he broke out from the trees, Remy would have an unobstructed shot at him. When Jac saw that Remy had moved away from the open door, he bolted out from the cover of the trees and ran toward the helicopter. Townsend was right behind him. The helicopter was rising from the beach. They were too late. Jac and Townsend watched the helicopter turn and move out to sea.
“Damn it!” Jac yelled. He ran toward the smaller Zodiac, which had been pulled up on the beach. If that son of a bitch harms Abi or any of the women, he thought, I’ll kill him!
Peri and Townsend saw where Jac was headed and met him at the Zodiac. A minute later, the three men were heading out after the helicopter with no plan, except to follow.
“I see it up ahead. It looks like the pilot is stalling,” Townsend said.
“What the hell is he doing?” Peri said.
The helicopter was hovering five hundred feet above the water about three hundred yards away from them. Suddenly it banked to the left, and then executed the same maneuver to the right. It looked like a dog shaking off water from its coat. After doing this several times, it straightened out and turned back toward the island.
“Was that a gunshot?” Townsend said.
Peri saw something in Jac’s eyes that scared him.
“Yeah … it was,” Jac muttered. He gunned the engine and sped after the fleeing helicopter.
The helicopter stopped and hovered a thousand yards from the beach. It tilted hard to its left side.
A body flew out the door and seemed to stop in midair for an instant. With arms and legs flailing, it plunged downward and splashed hard into the water.
All four women were on the floor of the helicopter. Abi and Chauncey lay side by side.
“We have to do something,” Abi said. The noise of the rotors covered her words from the man standing near the door watching them. Remy was up front with the pilot. Abi turned her head. She noticed the man had missed one of the weapons when he’d forced the women to slide them across the floor. A 9 mm Glock had wedged itself in the doorframe near Chauncey’s head. She motioned to Chauncey with her head and eyes.
“Over there … see it?” She mouthed the words.
“Yes,” Chauncey whispered.
The helicopter suddenly waved to the right and then to the left and repeated the movement several times. Remy was yelling at the pilot to stop. The man guarding them took his eyes off the women and looked toward the cockpit. Abi pushed her body against Chauncey, who in one sweeping motion, reached up, grabbed the weapon, flipped off the safety, and swung the weapon toward the man. She squeezed the trigger and fired a single shot. It hit the man in the chest. The helicopter lurched to the side again as the man dropped his weapon and flew backward out the door.
“Give it up now and I won’t punish you when I kill you,” Chauncey yelled at Remy.
“Bitch!” Remy yelled. He turned and fired two rounds toward the women.
The pilot seized the opportunity and dove to floor.
Roni screamed. One of the bullets had grazed her arm.
Auntie Mick reached up and pulled her back down to the floor.
“Roni! Oh, my god,” Abi screamed. She picked up the weapon the man had dropped and fired at Remy. Simultaneously Chauncey fired and emptied her Glock.
“I’m all right, Abi,” Roni yelled
Two bullets found their mark. One entered Remy’s neck and the other punctured his stomach, splitting the blood vessel that exited his heart. Remy screamed. “Fuck you, bitches!” His finger locked on the trigger of his automatic weapon sending a barrage of bullets toward the women and up through the roof. He then fell backward—dead. His body wedged itself across the control stick causing the helicopter to descend nose first toward the water.
Chauncey and Abi ran forward to help the pilot, but because of the angle of descent they lost their footing and fell forward landing on top of Remy’s body.
“Get off the stick!” the pilot yelled. Blood was running into his eyes from a deep gash on his head. He was pulling at Remy trying to move him when he fell back unconscious.
The women regained their footing and yanked and pulled Remy’s body away from the stick. Abi grabbed the stick and pulled back.
“Can you fly this thing?” Abi yelled. The helicopter’s nose came slowly up.
“No. Pull it all the way back. We’re going to crash,” Chauncey yelled. The noise was overwhelming as the engine squealed.
Below, Jac had the Zodiac at top speed. He looked up. He had pulled even with the falling bird, but it was still twenty feet above him.
“Pull up! Pull up!” he yelled. He could see Roni looking down at him.
At twenty-five feet above the water, the helicopter started to level, but it was still falling nose first.
Jac maneuvered the Zodiac near the falling bird, but it kept swaying to the right and left.
“Peri, get me close enough to jump through the door,” Jac yelled.
Peri moved down and grabbed the tiller. He maneuvered the Zodiac over toward the falling bird.
The helicopter came down within five feet above the water.
Jac jumped. His body hit the edge of the door. With nothing to grab onto, he was slipping out. Auntie Mick and Roni grabbed his arms, struggled to brace their legs on the side of the doorway, and pulled him aboard. Jac popped up and ran forward to the front. He saw Remy’s body on the floor, stepped over him, pulled the pilot out of his seat, and took his place. He had flown a Sikorsky SH-60F before. And this one was similar. He placed his feet on the pedals and stopped the sway. He gently eased the stick from Abi’s hands. As they were about to hit the water, Jac pulled back hard on the stick and got the helicopter’s nose up. The helicopter hit the water on its pontoons and bounced upward, gaining altitude. Jac pushed the stick forward, made some attitude corrections, and the helicopter was flying level and easy.
Abi was hovering over the pilot tending to his wound.
Chauncey grasped Jac’s shoulder and moved into the co-pilot’s seat.
“It’s ironic. We wanted to kill Remy for what he did, but we didn’t have to murder him. He murdered himself. We just assisted by defending ourselves,” Chauncey said. She proceeded to tell Jac the whole story of what had transpired.
“I’m glad for you that it worked out the way it has. Intentional killing would be a hard thing to live with.”
“Thank you for saving our lives,” Chauncey said. “I love you, Jac Kidd.”
“Everybody loves a good bus driver!” Jac said. He turned around to look in
the back. Roni and Auntie Mick were standing behind him smiling.
“Everyone okay?”
“Yes,” Auntie Mick said. “Thanks to you.”
“Is he going to be okay, Abi?” Auntie Mick asked.
“Yes. He took a hard knock on the head. He has a concussion and a deep wound that will need a couple of stitches. He’ll be all right once we get him to shore.” Abi had found the first-aid kit and had wound a bandage around the pilot’s head. Once that was done, she stood up and put her arms around Jac and leaned over. “I still love you.” She planted a kiss on his cheek and headed back to tend to Roni.
“I love you too,” Jac muttered. He could see that the black cloud was still over their heads. He wondered if they could ever get past the past.
Jac looked down at Remy’s body, and a smile crossed his face. Thank God. The ladies had killed him in self-defense.
Jac stuck his arm out the window and gave Peri and Townsend a thumbs up. He then signaled that he was heading back to the island.
Townsend waived at Jac, signaling. Peri waived and turned the boat around. He and Townsend headed back to retrieve the body that had fallen from the helicopter.
A few minutes later, Abi was back with Roni. “Roni has something she wants to tell us.”
Roni, with tears in her eyes, proceeded to tell Abi and Jac the story she had told to Peri and Auntie Mick.
“Oh, my God!” Abi burst out in tears.
Jac was stunned. Reg had never told him anything of another woman. Reg’s last words to him popped into his mind. “Take care of Abi, Jac.” He suddenly felt very sad for his friend.
Abi looked up at Jac and put her arms around him. “What we did wasn’t right, but knowing that it wasn’t what we did that caused Reg’s death lifts us out of the darkness and gives us some closure.”
“Maybe you guys can get a new start,” Roni said.”
“Jac and I need to talk. Right Jac?”
“Okay. Yeah.” He didn’t know what else to say. Jac’s eyes welled up. He saw the black cloud slowly dissipating.
Golden Legacy Page 26