by Jack Hardin
By the time I got onto the water, the sun was up, the water glistening with the early morning rays. I rode the boat hard, getting it up to just over 45 knots on calm water with a gentle tailwind. I was headed for Palmist, a small town on the west side of the island. As I plowed ahead, the Pitons grew ever larger. They were magnificent, a World Heritage Site, two green volcanic spires rising 3,000 feet above the ocean. The lush island is home to volcanic beaches, reef-diving sites, luxury resorts, and fishing villages. Trails in the interior rainforest lead to waterfalls and the capital, Castries, a popular cruise port.
I slowed on my approach and entered Soufriere Bay, where luxury sailboats and statements were tethered to their mooring balls. I followed the channel markers past them and docked at the marina. I had just paid my slip fee and was coming out of the marina’s offices when my phone rang. It was Brad.
“Hey, I’m back home,” he said. “Kathleen tells me you're on a vacation of your own.”
“If you want to call it that.”
“Do you need help? I’ve been lying on a boat for two weeks. I need something to do besides walking to a buffet.”
“I’m on an island I’m unfamiliar with, tracking down a psychopath who kidnapped a boy and his father. So, sure. If you want to come help me, I won’t say no.”
“I’ll be on the first flight out of Miami.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Call me when you land, and we’ll figure out a place to meet.”
“You got it, compadre.”
We hung up, and I reconsidered the fact that I didn’t have the foggiest idea where to start looking for Matthieu Sepion and his cousin Liam. I was saved by a text from Ellie. All it said was “Matthieu” followed by an address and a close map pin set onto a satellite image of Saint Lucia.
Her team had moved fast.
I rented a Jeep Cherokee, punched the address into my GPS, and drove off through the mountains to look for Matthieu, Edward Latham, and, I hoped, Joel Fagan.
CHAPTER
Ellie O’Conner turned the steering wheel and drove around a copse of wild bushes growing in the center of the dirt road. She slowed and drew along the unpainted cinderblock building. She parked, took out her sidearm, and exited the Tahoe she had retained.
The place was quiet and, as Amandine had said, in the middle of nowhere.
The front door was sturdy, recently painted a dark brown, and unlocked. Moving cautiously, and with her gun raised in front of her, she opened the door and peered inside.
She heard the rhythmic “swoosh-swoosh-swoosh” and stepped onto the bare concrete floor. As she turned the corner, she saw a young dark man on his hands and knees, running a scrub brush across the floor. A bucket full of suds was beside him.
A solitary rope hung from a rafter. The end looked as though it had been quickly severed.
“Freeze!” she called out.
The young man’s entire body jerked. The brush went flying as he leaned back and raised his hands.
Ellie stepped closer to see that the suds on the floor were red.
He was cleaning up a slip of blood.
“”Where is the boy?!”
“I—I—”
She stepped closer, settling the man’s head. “Where is the boy?”
CHAPTER
Edward Latham felt a rush of excitement as he finished testing the code a final time.
He had done it.
He had really done it.
Now he could get out of here. He would be reunited with Rory, and they could go back home.
As if on cue, the door behind him swung open. Edward swiveled around, and for the first time in three days, he felt relief and hope. “I did it!” he said.
Fagan’s boot heels slapped along the concrete with an even, haughty rhythm. “Did you now?” He stopped beside Edward’s chair and looked at the monitor. “Why don’t you show me?”
Edward spun around to the monitor and spent the next few minutes demonstrating what he had accomplished. “See, your container will slide right through now. The port will think it’s just a crate of Mike’s coming in from China.”
“Edward. You did good,” Fagan said.
Fagan brought out his phone and dialed a number. “Go ahead and dispose of the boy. I got what I needed.” Fagan hung up and slipped his phone into his pocket.
“What! No!” Edward protested. “No!”
“You served your purpose, Edward.”
“But my boy. You—you said you would let us go.”
Fagan laughed a genuine laugh from deep in his chest. “And you believed me?” He shook his head, still laughing. “I guess it is true what they say about hope. It the only thing standing between us and suicide.”
“No. No—please don’t do—”
The bullet from Fagan’s gun caught Edward just above his left brow. His head whipped back, rolled slowly back around, and stopped, and then his body slowly slid off the chair. His head smacked the ground with a sickening thud that made even Fagan a little queasy. “Sorry, old boy. Business is business.”
CHAPTER
I pulled off into the woods a quarter mile from where Ellie’s team said the dirty cop’s phone was. I advanced the rest of the way on foot, finally coming to a windowless, unpainted concrete structure. I looked like a storm shelter.
A tall man was standing at the entrance of an open doorway, a rifle in his hands. It was Matthieu.
A loud gunshot reverberated from inside. Matthieu turned in the direction of the sound. I made my move, bursting from cover and charging him as I fired. He fell to the ground and I rushed past him and through the open doorway. Joel Fagan was standing over Edward Latham’s dead body.
“Drop the gun, Fagan.”
Fagan cursed loudly. “Savage! What the hell...what are you...what are you doing here?”
Suddenly, his surprise turned into a smile as I felt the cold steel barrel of a gun on my neck.
I sighed. “Liam, I presume.”
Fagan smiled. “Thank you, Liam. You can leave us. I need to have a private conversation with Mr. Savage, here.”
Liam left and Fagan produced a pair of handcuffs. He tossed them to me. “Put those on.”
I stared at him, unmoving.
“Don’t be a hardass,” he said. “Put them on.”
I did as he said, and he ordered me to take a seat in Edward’s vacant chair. I did as he said. “So what now?” I asked. “You feed me to the sharks?”
“I haven’t decided yet. But I’m leaving this place.” Fagan crossed his arms and tapped his chin with a finger. “You might come in handy,” he mused quietly. “I’ll think I’ll take you with me.”
Fagan disappeared from my periphery. I heard a thin scuffle behind me just before something hit me hard on the back of the head. I saw a burst of white stars as my body pitched forward. I was out cold before my face hit the floor.
CHAPTER
Ellie O’Conner stared through the windshield as the house in front of her. The windows were dark, and thick trees filled the small front yard. She had left the man she had found in the cinder block building tied up in the trees a half mile back.
He had told her that this is where they had moved the boy.
She exited the SUV and slowly made her way through the trees, across the yard, and up to the front porch. She heard the whine of an old television and nothing more. Setting her hand on the door handle, she tried it slowly. It gave, and she stepped inside. The hallway was narrow and dark. The television was on in a room at the end. Ellie cleared each room until she reached the end. A man was asleep on the couch, his shirt riding up his stomach.
Ellie’s stomach twisted as she looked in the corner and saw a young boy, his head hanging limply onto his chest. Having cleared the rest of the house, she yelled at the man on the couch. He jerked awake and immediately went for a pistol sitting on top of a pizza box in front of him.
She shot him. Five times. He fell back onto the couch and lay still.
The noise of the firearm di
scharging startled the boy. His head rose slowly, and then his eyes widened as they came to rest on Ellie. He whimpered.
Ellie moved to him and, grabbing a dirty knife off a nearby table, cut his bonds.
He pitched forward and she caught him, held him.
“Yes, sweetheart,” she soothed. “You’re going to be okay.”
CHAPTER
Joel Fagan stared through the cockpit's windshield into the vast expanse of blue sky spread out before him. The view up here was stunning. The atmosphere was unsullied by cloud or pollution; nothing but clear skies all the way home, baby.
The only blot to speak of at all was the ass stain in the back. Fagan had spent the last half-hour thinking about what to do about it. Ryan Savage’s appearance on the island was, to say the least, disconcerting, if not outright unnerving.
Somehow, over the last several months, Savage had become his bane, there to pull the fuse on Fagan’s well-laid plans every time the fireworks were about to go off.
Fagan rubbed at his five o’clock shadow with the palm of his hand and then shrugged to himself. One idea was as good as the next, he supposed. Might as well go with the one that the mentally well-endowed referred to as Occam’s Razor: the simplest answer is often the best.
“Don’t run a red light,” he said to the pilot. “I’ll be right back.” He removed his headset, slipped out of his seat, and shimmied through the cockpit door.
Ryan Savage was sitting on the carpeted floor with his feet in front of him, his knees up, hands zip-tied behind his back. Fagan was pleased to see that Savage’s nose had swollen to such a degree that it now looked like a hive of bees had worked it over. His lips and chin were caked with blood, too.
Fagan yelled over the sound of the engines and the wind rushing by outside. “How’s it going back here?”
“I think I overpaid,” Savage yelled back. “Is this how you treat all your first class passengers?”
“The pilot is concerned that we’re a little over our max recommended cargo weight.”
The aircraft leveled off, and the drone of the engines quieted as the pilot bled off some speed.
“He’s informed me that relieving the aircraft of some unneeded weight is probably wisest if we’re going to follow the safety guidelines.” Fagan stepped up to his captive, hooked his hands under Savage’s arms, and hauled him to his feet. “Stay there.”
Fagan moved to the cargo door.
Savage yelled back, “You’re joking, right? You kill me and Homeland will descend on you like locusts.”
“I’m moving on, my friend. New opportunities await. New opportunities in new countries that will require new aliases. Let them send every damned Fed and Marine after me. They won’t even find a whiff of my cologne.” Fagan grasped onto a metal handgrip with one hand, then reached out with his other, unlatched the door, and threw it open.
Wind rushed furiously into the empty fuselage, screaming through the empty space like a newly awakened spirit, whipping his hair and clothes and nearly splitting his eardrums. He stumbled back to Savage and tried to shove him toward the doorway. Savage planted his feet and lowered his center of gravity. But the feeble effort was useless. Fagan slapped a hand between his shoulder blades, grabbed his bound wrists, and lifted them in a single swift motion.
Fagan shoved him forward, frogmarching his adversary to the threshold as he felt the thrilling rush of victory at his fingertips.
Fagan leaned in and brought his mouth near so Savage could hear him. “I’m going to go pay Kathleen a visit,” he yelled over the rushing wind. “Maybe have a little fun with her! Too bad you can’t join us tonight!”
Savage bucked hard against him, but to no avail. Fagan had him pinned perfectly, his joints and muscles leveraged so that any movement at all would send hot bolts of pain through the agent’s limbs.
“It’s been fun, Savage. But as I recently told my girlfriend, sometimes the fun has to end! Enjoy the ride!”
And with that, he gave him a hard thrust and watched him fall into the wide open sky.
Fagan stumbled back and pressed the button for the door to re-engage. It moved back into place, creating a renewed seal that once again blocked out the rush of the wind. Fagan worked his jaw to relieve the pressure in his ears.
He returned to the cockpit and buckled into his seat. Slipping the headset back over his ears, he lifted his thumb and jammed it into the air. “Let's get back up there.”
The pilot fidgeted with several controls and set his hand back on the throttle. Fagan rested his head back on the seat as they started to climb once again.
Finally, he said, “We need to make a brief detour.”
“Where to?”
“TavernAero Park. A private airstrip just north of Plantation Key.”
“I know it. But if I remember correctly, you have to have a member present to represent you when you land.”
“I am a member,” Fagan said. “Albeit under a different name.”
The pilot nodded and banked slightly to the north, the shadows slanting across the cockpit.
Beside him, Joel Fagan grinned happily, expectantly, eager for what the remainder of the day held.
He couldn’t wait.
Part Three
As the garage door shuddered up, Kathleen Rose eased her Lexus forward, pressing the clicker again as she parked. She turned off the car. The door rolled back down on its track, leaving her in complete silence as it shut completely.
She stepped out and entered her home via a door that led through the laundry room and into the kitchen. She set her purse on the island’s granite counter, selected a wine glass from the cupboard, and ruffled her hair.
It had been a long day.
She selected a bottle of red from a custom wine rack built in between the cabinets, opened the bottle, and poured herself a generous serving. Her feet hurt, and she slipped out of her heels and walked out of the kitchen.
She froze.
A man was sitting comfortably on the couch in her living room. One hand held a lowball glass, half-filled with ice and amber liquid. In his other hand, resting easily on the arm of the couch, was a suppressed pistol.
Kathleen felt her heart begin to race. “Joel,” she said calmly.
“Kathleen.” Fagan let the word slip slowly from his mouth, as if he were playing with it.
“What are you doing here?”
Fagan looked away and chuckled. “Your question is a bit redundant, don’t you think? I mean, seeing that Ryan Savage works—worked—for you and has been hunting me down with your permission.” He looked back at her and smiled. “Have a seat.”
Kathleen placed her wine glass on the dining room table. Her feet padded quietly across the tile. She slid past the glass-top coffee table and sat into one of the leather armchairs across from her former fiancé.
Fagan’s gaze lingered over her black pantsuit and where the top buttons of her blouse opened up below her neck. “My, my. You look as good as ever.”
“Joel, what do you mean, Ryan ‘worked’ for me?”
“Ryan? Oh, yes. Well, I don’t know what you thought would happen. You sent someone to find me who was way out of his depth. That thing in Costa Rica, we both know he just got lucky. But this time… this time he met his match.”
Kathleen closed her eyes. “What did you do to him?” she asked coolly.
“Let’s just say that he had a fall from grace.”
“He’s dead?”
“Indeed.”
Kathleen frowned deeply, her jaw tensed, but she said nothing.
“You know,” Fagan continued, “I was on my way to Mexico just a little bit ago when I decided that it might be rude to pass over without stopping to say hello to an old friend.” He looked around the room, observing the layout and the decor. “You’ve done well for yourself. I always knew they had you by the short hairs. Still God and country, is it?
“And what about you, Joel? You betrayed your country, and your god...what is it, money?”
Fagan chuckled eerily. “No, sweetheart. Not money. I mean, money is good, don’t get me wrong. I suppose it’s the thrill of the whole thing.”
“What happened to you?”
Fagan seemed somewhat unprepared for that question. But he answered quickly enough. “Happened to me? Kathleen, you inhabit a world that is black and white. Us versus them. Good guys versus bad guys. But I don’t see life that way. My favorite color is gray. Because the world is gray. Nothing is cut and dry.”
“You’re not going to sit on my couch and convince me that kidnapping women and children, mothers and fathers, and forcing them to do your bidding is gray. Why don’t you just leave the philosophizing to the professionals?”
“That’s what I always liked about you, Kathleen. You’re feisty.”
“What exactly are you doing here, Joel? Is it to gloat, to show me how powerful you are? Because you’ll always be a deadbeat who betrayed everything that truly matters in life.”
Fagan looked away. “Yes…” he mused. “Perhaps I did.” He returned his gaze to Kathleen. “So I suppose it’s time to say goodbye.” He raised himself off the back of the couch and sat up straight. He raised the gun and pointed it at her head.
“Not yet,” she said.
“I’m sorry?”
“I said, not yet. I’ll save my final goodbye for the day the judge lays out your sentencing.”
He huffed. “Sentencing? You think I’m bluffing? Sweetheart, this gun isn’t empty.”
“And neither is mine, you bastard.”
Behind her, the dining room window shattered. Fagan was thrown back into the couch as a .223 semi-automatic bullet punched into his shoulder, tearing muscles and tendons, shattering bone.
Fagan’s gun clattered to the floor; his glass tumbled from his hand and splintered onto the tile. Kathleen slowly leaned forward and set her wine glass on the table. She took her time standing up and then approached the couch. Looking down, she slapped the gun with the bottom of her foot, and it slid across the floor, coming to rest beneath her dining room table.
Fagan’s face was ashen, and he sat writhing in front of her, blood coating his shoulder and staining the couch from the exit wound in the back.