Orange Blossoms & Mayhem (Fantascapes)

by Blair Bancroft

  Doug shoved the motor to full-throttle, and we rose right out of the water and flew. The Sheriff’s Department was going to get a lot of complaints from irate home owners. Airboats are tolerated as a necessity in the everglades, but highly frowned on in quiet Calusa County. Which was one of the reasons my brothers had so enjoyed having one. Born for trouble, that was the Halliday kids. And not just the brothers.

  For this operation Doug was mine to command. A unique moment I’d never thought to see. Me, giving orders to Doug. Wow! As for Jeff and Flint . . . well, let’s just say the Sheriff was tolerant of Halliday eccentricities and well aware that I was the person in the midst of the action, the eyes and ears of today’s “training exercise.” I hadn’t, however, told Charlie Purvis about Doug and the airboat, not wanting to give him an opportunity to veto our bit of private enterprise. I hadn’t even told Dad. Flint and Jeff, of course, had to know. Had to be willing to juggle the fine line between duty and friendship.

  My phone squawked. “They’re in the river, turning south, heading toward the bridge,” Jeff said.

  We’d done it! Fooled Viktor, hopefully more thoroughly than he’d fooled me. Not only did he think he’d have time to clear the 776 bridge, but he hadn’t expected a fast pursuit, knowing most of the county’s meager patrol fleet was distributed along the gulf and the Intracoastal Waterway—a very long way from the mouth of the Calusa River. He did not, in fact, expect anyone to follow him by water at all. He’d thought the wedding guests, as well as the silly little wedding planner, would be too horrified to notice which way he and his men went. He expected the police to arrive too late to see his small boat glide away, particularly since the banks on both side of the canal were so densely covered by underbrush. Viktor thought he’d be under the 776 bridge and into Charlotte Harbor before anyone even thought to consider a water getaway.

  And that’s where we had him.

  I pushed the Talk button again. “Jeff, time to block the 776 bridge. Men above and below ”

  “You got it.”

  As I lowered my phone, Rhys leaned across the bucket seat to shout in my ear. “You do realize you’re giving orders to the Sheriff’s Department and the FBI?”

  I kept my eyes front, the wind tearing the combs from my hair, bronze curls whipping back from my face. “I was giving orders to Jeff. He’ll make like a diplomat, convince the big guys it was all their idea.”

  “And what do we do when we catch up?” Rhys asked. “You’re a civilian, Laine. Shoot somebody and you’ll likely be the one who ends up in jail.”

  I couldn’t believe he said that.

  Rhys was still standing there, glaring at me. What could I say to a police officer who couldn’t make an arrest? Who wasn’t supposed to carry a gun? How to explain, it never occurred to me not to be out here chasing Viktor down?

  “Not in Florida,” I snapped, adding a look designed to shrivel his manhood.

  Doug poked me in the back. Still clinging to the seat back, I raised my ear as close to his mouth as I could. “What if they go upriver?” he asked.

  “In a cruiser? No way!” I paused, thought about it. Frowned. Just a bit south of the canal we were on, the several streams that gave Three Rivers its name, plus a whole bunch of canals dug by developers, poured into the Calusa, transforming it from a narrow jungle river overhung by branches and teeming with wildlife into a local Mississippi, almost three quarters of a mile wide. Surely Viktor needed open water, not a cul-de-sac that became unnavigable not far north of Halliday House. “Why?” I demanded.

  “Contingency. They spot the chopper, know they can’t get to Charlotte Harbor. Lots of wilderness along the upper Calusa. Maybe they have a car waiting. Or they’re bringing one in. Fast.”

  Oh, shit! It was possible. No one ever said Viktor was stupid. To the south was a long bridge whose cement arches were blocked by posts to make certain boats stuck to the two open arches of the channel, dead center. The arches that would be thoroughly blocked by the time Viktor’s boat got there. With county cops, FBI, and FHP, all armed to the teeth, aiming guns at them from above.

  But to the north, there was almost nothing. Both sides of the narrow river were owned by a vast cattle ranch. It had just been sold and was about to be swallowed up in the Florida development boom, but at the moment it was still twenty thousand acres of old Florida—except for dirt ranch roads or hunting trails cut by men out for deer or wild pig. Easy enough to make a back-up plan to transfer to a 4x4 under cover of overhanging trees and bushes.

  I lifted my cell phone. “Jeff, are they still heading south?”

  “Absolutely. Tell Doug to get a move on.”

  “What if they do a U-ey and head upriver?”

  “No way. There’s a bottleneck directly upriver from the canal—shallow water and a tight turn. Even if the cruiser makes it through, where could it go? Nuts to go north.”

  I gave Doug a look almost as annihilating as the one I’d given Rhys. He shrugged, but didn’t smile. He still had his doubts. So Viktor hadn’t yet realized the chopper was a spotter for the police. Or that there was no way he could get past the 776 bridge.

  Once again, Rhys leaned over to shout in my ear. “They’ve got automatic rifles, Laine. We can’t take them on with a couple of hand guns.”

  “So why’d you come?”

  “To keep you from getting killed!”

  I nodded toward a long canvas case in the well of the boat. “Guess it’s time to break out the reserves.” Might as well let Rhys do it himself. A good lesson in never underestimating a Halliday.

  “Laine?” Rhys was on his knees, staring down into the long unzipped case. “You haven’t . . . you wouldn’t . . . ?”

  “No good now,” I told him, glancing at the RPG launcher with supreme regret. “Can’t blow up Marina. Dig farther. There should be some MP-5s in there. Ever use one?”

  “Believe it or not,” Rhys shouted back, “we have firing ranges in England. In Lyon, too. Paper tigers that we are, we’re still policemen. Even if we have to walk a fine line.”

  “Which you’ve already crossed, so hand me one, will you?”

  Rhys checked the weapon, rammed home the long lethal ammunition clip, and handed it to me. I could see him forming an admonition to be sure to let the bad guys fire first, but, fortunately, he had the good sense not to say it. Rhys loaded a second rifle. Doug held out a hand. Wordlessly, Rhys handed him the gun, found a third MP-5 for himself. He pulled the canvas back, checked the number of ammunition clips, then shook his head. “You could start a small war,” he said.

  “Viktor started it. I’m finishing it.”

  Just before he looked away, I caught the withdrawal in his eyes. Rhys Tarrant wanted a brave girl, a lively, even daring, girl. But about vengeful, bloodthirsty women he had his doubts.

  How to tell him it surprised me too. That I hadn’t really thought to carry it this far . . .

  Oh, yes, I had. Or Doug wouldn’t be here. The weapons wouldn’t be here. Not that I’d told him to bring an RPG. The thought hadn’t crossed my mind, but Doug was Doug, and at times his business led him into very strange shit.

  I could live with that. Easier than with a man who was a policeman who never carried a gun.

  Time to fight that problem later.

  We burst out of the canal, Doug turning the boat in a broad arcing left into the Calusa River, which suddenly spread before us, at this point, three times the width of the canal. When we’d fully rounded the bend, we might be able to see Viktor’s cruiser. I signaled for Doug to pass me his binoculars. MP-5 slung over my back, an incongruous contrast to the pastel silk whipping around my knees, I strained to see past a solid phalanx of trees. Flint and Jeff were no longer that far in front of us. We were catching up. Come on, come on, come on!

  Nothing but mangrove swamp on both sides of us now. We roared around the final part of the broad bend into a mile-long straight stretch of water, the cruiser clearly visible in the distance. And so were we, of course. An airboat
slamming hard on the cruiser’s tail would not go ignored. The helicopter would be recognized as the enemy as well.

  I took a good look through the binoculars, or as good a look as I could while skimming the surface of a river in an airboat. Viktor’s cruiser was exactly as Jeff had described. Big enough to zip out into the Gulf of Mexico and head . . . anywhere. Cuba, the Caribbean islands, the Yucatan, even a waiting cargo ship. Or he could simply hole up on one of the many islands in Charlotte Harbor, just another boat off on a weekend of fishing or seeking a private spot for a bit of serious partying.

  We stopped Viktor now, or not at all.

  “Jeff, how’s the blockade going?”

  “Moving into place. Not to worry. You’re at least six miles out. Plenty of time.”

  I relayed the information to Rhys and Doug, tightened my grip on my MP-5. I suspect my face looked as determined as Wyatt Earp heading for the O K corral because Rhys shouted, “We have to take Viktor alive. You know that, Laine. He’s a walking database on the Miami traffickers. If he betrayed them once, he’ll do it again.”

  “He sold out to the New York guy, right?”

  Rhys nodded. “To Dmitri Chazov. There’s no other explanation. Viktor was tight with Rufikov and his captains, the perfect choice to set this whole thing up to wipe them out at one time. Making Chazov boss of all operations east of the Mississippi.”

  Doug shouted, pointed. We were close enough now that Viktor’s goons were distinguishable in the stern. They’d seen us, were studying us through binoculars. I returned the favor, looking in vain for a glimpse of Marina. Instead, the goons’ AK-47s loomed large, as our MP-5s would to them. Enemy sighted. Identified.

  The men on the boat turned their field glasses on the helicopter. Broad gestures. Surprise. Anger. Viktor came charging out of the cabin into the stern. We were catching up fast, maybe only a half-mile behind now, and I had to concede Rhys a point. What did we do when we caught up? There’s no cover in an airboat. We were sitting ducks.

  To prove the point, a spray of bullets hit the water not twenty feet in front of us. Doug cut the engine back. “Relax, Tarrant,” he yelled above the still considerable roar. “We’re just beaters, driving them toward the bridge.”

  “And if they turn around?”

  “Then we stop them,” I said.

  “How?”

  “Any way we can.”

  One of the goons raised his AK-47 toward the circling chopper. The one thing I practice assiduously is my marksmanship. I braced my feet, set my HK to manual—three rounds only—and raised the rifle to my shoulder.

  “Laine! You could hit Viktor.”

  To hell with Rhys’s long-view. Maybe I wanted to hit Viktor. I aimed. Steady . . . steady. How could anybody be steady in a fucking airboat? I fired. Incredibly, the wiseguy with the AK-47 trained on Jeff and Flint crumpled into the stern well.

  “Tell Jeff to get his ass out of there,” Doug snapped. We weren’t just thinking of Jeff and Flint. The sheriff would never forgive us if we lost his one and only helicopter.

  The chopper veered off, gaining altitude. We settled into one of those O J chases, moving steadily toward the bridge, just out of reliable firing range of each other. Flint and Jeff hovered, also out of effective range. We passed a maze of small mangrove islands and false channels, and then, suddenly, the Calusa broadened into a three-quarter-mile expanse of water. My phone beeped. “Four miles,” Jeff said. “And thanks, kid. Great shooting.”

  I held up four fingers to Rhys and Doug. They nodded. Although I never took my eyes off the cruiser, I didn’t see Viktor again. Or Marina. Another wiseguy had taken the place of the man I’d hit, leaving two AK-47s trained as steadily on us as Rhys and I were on them.

  The going was tougher here. Deeper water, not such a glassy surface. A definite risk. We kept going. Three miles to the bridge. Two. One. Just after Jeff’s announcement of one mile, the forward lookout on the cruiser spotted the solid array of patrol cars on the bridge, the flashing red and blue lights, the two police boats blocking off the double arches of the channel. The cruiser lost way rapidly, wallowing in the water, while Viktor considered his options. Doug powered down as well. This was a case of near-silence being deafening. We were poised, teetering on the edge of a precipice. I flipped the HK to auto. And waited.

  The cruiser roared into life, made a broad circle, and came back at us, full speed, but not before we’d had time to get a good look at Viktor in the stern, holding a gun to the head of a terrified female gowned in poofy white silk, her blonde hair flying in the wind. Marina.

  Blast it, we couldn’t shoot. Couldn’t stand against their fire power. Had no place to hide. I heard the chopper swooping in, knew Jeff would be hanging out the door, ready to join the fight, but the odds were terrible. I dropped to the floor, grabbed up the RPG launcher. I had no idea how to fire it, but Viktor didn’t know that. Dear God, it was heavy! Rhys took it from me, lifted it to his own shoulder. Took aim.

  As I’ve said, Viktor isn’t stupid. He removed his gun from Marina’s head, extending his arm out to one side. The goons, following his lead, lowered their guns. The cruiser, twin diesels never faltering, roared by us at a distance of not more than fifty feet. A stand-off. Not a shot was fired. Viktor wasn’t going to meekly let us take him, but he was going to compromise. Because the “or else” was not an acceptable alternative. God bless Doug and his arsenal of illegal weapons.

  Rhys kept the RPG trained on the cruiser until it was a good half mile upriver. When he lowered it at last, the three of us simply looked at each other. That had been a little closer than any of us expected. Except maybe Doug. I’d had a strong lesson in how much I had yet to learn. But I was a Halliday, and I had to be ready to take it, to come up with a quip and a smile and carry on. I turned to Rhys. “We’ll never tell,” I said with a wink. But that little incident was enough to blackmail him forever. One peep about his hefting an RPG launcher, hot pursuit or no, and all dreams of high office at Interpol would be gone forever.

  “I’m on leave,” Rhys muttered. Doug and I grinned at him, well pleased to discover the man from Interpol was a true cop at heart.

  Doug revved up the motor, and we did our own broad circle, heading back upriver, the airboat bucking the current, bouncing worse than Bella through a thunderstorm. The narrow, shallower river couldn’t come soon enough.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Jeff beeped me. “We’re it, kid. If your Russians make it through the narrows, there’s nothing but swamp and grazing land for the next ten miles. No road access. So . . . you going to use that cannon you’ve got?”

  “They’ve got Marina.”

  “Yeah, well, who says she’s not a part of it?”

  “Sheriff wouldn’t approve,” I countered. “And Interpol wants Viktor for questioning.”

  “Listen, kid, me taking pot shots from the chopper just isn’t going to do it. And that damned airboat has about as much cover as Venus on the Half-Shell. Time to get real. You want the bastards to get away?”

  SWAT team member advocating an illegal shoot? Good thing we weren’t on an open line. Jeff might be right, but I couldn’t do it. Not even by handing the RPG to Doug. Maybe . . . if Marina weren’t on board. But mass murder didn’t set well. If we got down to an absolute Them or Us . . .

  If Viktor made it through the narrows, I had one slim hope. One last chance to nab him before he lost himself in the wilderness of the upper Calusa. A chance we might be able to take because the FBI had banned the Gerries and the Three Rivers cops from the 776 blockade. I grabbed my phone and alerted both sets of frustrated cops and ex-cops.

  The six miles back upriver flew, the gradually shallower water allowing us to maintain flat-out speed. We kept on the cruiser’s tail, fifty yards back, the threat of our RPG keeping the AK-47s silent. We roared around the broad bend south of the Three Rivers canal. Suddenly, ahead of us, just beyond the place where the canal went off to the right, the cruiser powered down. They’d reached the bott
leneck Jeff had mentioned earlier, the place where the river did a nasty turn and mangrove thickets intruded so heavily on the left that navigability was reduced to a squeeze and a prayer.

  “Low tide,” Doug pronounced with considerable satisfaction as he cut our engine.

  “Here?” Rhys asked.

  “Oh, yeah. All the way upriver past our house. Only a foot or so, but it makes a difference.”

  The cruiser’s engines were down to idling speed, but momentum kept it moving inexorably forward. Twin diesels screamed as the pilot threw them into reverse. Too late. The cruiser plowed into the mud flats. Slowed, shuddered. Stuck fast. Completely blocking the channel.

  As we drifted closer, the goons in the stern raised their AK-47s, covering a flurry of activity near the bow. A raft . . . they were launching a raft! I caught a glimpse of the small attached motor as the raft was shoved over the side near the bow. Viktor reached into the forward hatch . . . a billow of white as he hauled Marina out, dropped her into the raft, then climbed in after her. The bastard. He was abandoning his men, leaving them to cover his escape.

  I punched the walkie-talkie. “Jeff, come get me!”

  “No way, honeychild.”

  “Right now!”

  The next voice I heard was Flint’s. “This is an official Sheriff’s helicopter, darlin’,” he drawled. “No civilian passengers. No problem. We’ve got it covered.”

  “I’m in imminent danger of being shot. Pretend you’re the Coast Guard and haul me up!”

  Doug grabbed my phone. “Do as she says,” he ordered, even though he had no more authority than I did. “This is Laine’s show. Let her finish it.” He returned my phone, shook his head at Rhys. “No sense you getting into any more trouble, Tarrant.” Doug climbed down off his perch, picked up the RPG launcher, and leveled it at the cruiser. If ever anyone looked like he knew what to do with a rocket propelled grenade, it was my brother Doug. Above us, the rescue cable began to snake down from the chopper. Flint was so low, it didn’t have far to go. I climbed on, and the winch pulled me up, swinging crazily beneath the chopper as Flint took it up and out, away from the goon’s guns. Just in case they decided suicide was worth taking me out for all the trouble I’d caused.