Horizons Beyond the Darkness

by Scott B. Williams

  Grant ran after her, knowing he had startled her, but determined to catch up and let her know he was Scully’s friend and there to help her. With the head start she had though, there was no way he could reach her before she made it to the woods, and by the time he passed the spot where she’d been digging, she was already out of sight. A glance at the sand as he sprinted past told him she’d found turtle eggs buried there, and he wondered how long she’d been away from her boat to be foraging for food this far from the anchorage. He called out to her again and again as he ran, and he’d almost reached the spot where she entered the woods when he felt something zip past the back of his head, lightly brushing his hair. The report of a rifle reached his ears just a split second after, and Grant redirected his next stride into a long forward dive to the sand as he realized what was happening. Keeping low, he crawled as fast as he could for the edge of the bushes, still a dozen feet away. Another bullet struck the beach so close that Grant was stung in the face by the sand it kicked up, but then he reached the concealment of the vegetation, forcing his way into the tangle before the shooter had time for another try. His heart was racing as he considered how close the bullets had come. Who could be shooting at him, and why? The only answer Grant could come up with was that maybe it was Mindy’s husband, Thomas. Maybe they were foraging separately on the island and Thomas had suddenly returned to the beach and seen Grant chasing her and didn’t know who he was. Yes that had to be it. The shots came from back where the road ended at the cove. Grant was wondering whether he should risk calling out to Mindy again when he suddenly heard her call his own name in a loud, frightened whisper from much nearer than he expected.

  “I didn’t know who you were! I thought you were one of those men trying to kill me!” Mindy said, as she suddenly appeared out of the thicket, not far from where he was still crawling on his hands and knees.

  “What men? Who is trying to kill you? I thought it was Thomas shooting at me, because he saw me running after you. Where is Thomas, Mindy? Is he here on the island with you?”

  Grant saw her look away instead of answering immediately. Then, she started crying. “Thomas is dead! Those men killed him! I knew they would come back to look for me, and now they are here!”

  Grant was confused by all that she was saying, but the bullets that nearly hit him were real, whoever the unseen shooter was. He urged Mindy deeper into the woods, and there they came to the tangle that had prevented her from going any farther in her bid to escape him.

  “We’ve got to go through there, Mindy, and work our way back around to the other side of the island. Larry and Jessica are waiting there with the boat.” Grant drew his machete from the sheath at his belt. “Stay back and I’ll cut us a path through this mess. We’ve got to hurry!”

  “They maybe looking for us over there too. They know this island. They are policemen, Grant!”

  “Policemen? Why would they kill Thomas and shoot at me if they were policemen? Are you sure, Mindy?”

  “No, but they said they were, and they were wearing uniforms. They searched our boat. They found the guns we had. They shot Thomas and they tried to shoot me, but I ran. I’ve been hiding from them ever since, but they didn’t come back until now.”

  “They are not over there where your boat is anchored. I know that because our catamaran is right beside it. We saw that it was locked and that the rudder was missing; that’s why I came looking for you.”

  “Our boat is still there? I thought they would take it. I was afraid to go back because I thought they might be waiting for me there.”

  “Yes, it’s still there, anchored near the beach.”

  “You didn’t find…” Mindy stumbled for the words as the tears ran down her face… “You didn’t find Thomas, did you? He fell into the water.”

  Grant shook his head. He couldn’t imagine what this poor woman had been through, seeing her husband shot before her eyes like that. Maybe there was a body in the waters of the anchorage, or washed up ashore somewhere nearby, but if it was there, he and Larry and Jessica had overlooked it. But then that wasn’t what they’d been looking for either.

  “Mindy, did these men say where they were from? No one lives on this island, according to Larry, unless they have set up a refugee camp or something since the collapse.”

  “They said something about a town, I don’t remember the name of it. They came in a motorboat, an old wooden one. We thought they were fishermen at first. They seemed friendly, and we were caught off guard on the beach making breakfast. All of the guns were on the boat, and there was no time to get to them even if we had tried.”

  Mindy went on to say that there were three of them that day but that she thought she’d hurt one of them pretty bad. Grant had to assume there were at least two on the island now, and maybe they’d brought more friends. The two shots fired at him could have been from the same gun or from two different ones. He’d seen nothing, so there was no way to know.

  “Mindy, whoever shot at me just now is going to come after us, but I’ve got a rifle too, and I’m going to have to try and take them out. We already know what they’ll do if I don’t. Making our way through here with them chasing us is too slow, and they will easily be able to follow our trail because of the cutting. Here’s what we need to do: Can you use this?” He handed her the machete by the handle.

  “I think so.”

  “Good. Then take it and keep going straight that way. Cut any of the branches or vines that are in your way. Don’t worry about how much noise you make, because the more the better. I’m going to find a place to hide off to the side of the trail and wait for them. If you hear shooting, it will probably be me so don’t stop! Just keep going and I will find you as soon as I’m finished!”

  Sixteen

  LARRY LISTENED IN DISBELIEF to the rapid-fire pop of the semiautomatic .22 rifle. Jessica was firing as fast as she could pull the trigger, and the man with the AK screamed in pain as he tried in vain to get back to the deck. Larry heard him tumble down the steps and land on the plywood sole with a heavy thud. For a split second, he expected the other man with the shotgun to shoot him immediately but instead he rushed to the cabin too. Larry didn’t have time to scream a warning before the man blindly fired two rounds from the 12-gauge through the open companionway.

  “NO!!! JESSICA!!!”

  During Larry’s entire conversation with the strangers Jessica had remained quiet and stayed put, which was a relief, but when the man with the AK lifted the companionway hatch, he knew it was inevitable that she would be found. If she was still holding onto that .22 rifle when the man saw her, he would shoot her immediately and there wasn’t a damned thing Larry could do about it. He cursed himself under his breath for being so stupid. He should have opened fire on the bastards the minute they approached the Casey Nicole. Now he was handcuffed at gunpoint on his own boat, and along with him, Jessica would pay the price for his complacency and for putting her trust in him. When the one in charge had ordered the other to handcuff him, Larry still thought he was simply being arrested and that the matter could be straightened out somehow, maybe with a bribe or something. If he had known they were going to kill him anyway, he would have never submitted to the cuffs and at least he could have died fighting. This way sucked, and he couldn’t think of a thing he could do about it. As a last resort, he considered yelling to Jessica to start shooting when the man entered the cabin. But he wasn’t sure she would do it and if she hesitated or missed, it was going to get her killed anyway. He had no doubt the one with the AK meant business, and even though the other fellow appeared less threatening and said little, the fact remained that he was pointing a shotgun at him. Larry knew what a 12-gauge would do to a man at that range and it didn’t matter whether it was loaded with slugs, buckshot or birdshot.

  Now all hell had broken loose aboard the Casey Nicole because Jessica had done what he’d wanted to suggest but was afraid to tell her. She had taken down the first man but now two rounds from that shotgun had been unl
eashed at her. Larry screamed her name and expected he would be next until he was startled to hear three sharp cracks from Jessica’s .22 instead. He saw the second man stagger back in surprise, dropping the shotgun as he fell backwards into the cockpit. Then Larry saw the muzzle of the .22 emerge from the cabin opening as Jessica took careful aim and fired two more rounds. The fallen man went instantly limp, shot in the head from ten feet away. It was over just that fast.

  “Jessica! Are you all right? Are you hit?”

  She climbed out and set the rifle down on the cockpit seat, her bare legs and feet all bloody. Larry was aghast for a second, but the blood wasn’t hers. She’d had to climb over the body of the fallen man to get out, and she’d been standing in his blood on the cabin sole while firing those last rounds.

  “I’m okay, Larry. I was just scared. Are you hurt?”

  “No, but I can’t do a damned thing with these handcuffs on. The key is probably on that guy you shot in the cabin. Are you sure he’s dead?”

  “Yes, I’m sure.”

  “I thought you were too for a minute, Jessica. How close did those shotgun rounds come? I can’t believe they missed!”

  “Really close! There are holes in the side of the cabin, right over your bunk!”

  “Thank God none through you though.”

  “I killed a policeman, Larry! I didn’t want to have to do it, but I heard what he said. They were going to kill you!”

  “And they would have killed you too when they found you. You did what you had to do, Jessica. If that guy ever was a real policeman, he was probably always a criminal hiding in a uniform. Now we know why Thomas and Mindy didn’t make it back to the Jumentos.”

  “Grant! That other one was going to look for Grant, Larry! We’ve got to do something! He has no idea what’s going on.”

  “You’re right. We’ve got a lot to do, Jessica, but I can’t do anything until you find that key and get me out of these damned handcuffs!”

  “Okay, give me a minute. It’s not going to be easy. There’s blood everywhere in the cabin and I almost slipped in it trying to climb out. I’ll see if I can find them but he’s big. I don’t know if I can move him by myself.”

  “Try his pockets, or maybe a key ring on his belt! There’s got to be one. And bring that AK back up here too. The other guy that went ashore may have heard the shooting and could come back here any minute!”

  * * *

  Sidney Evans cursed his bad luck and his haste in firing his first shot without taking more care to set it up. Now he had missed and his target was gone. He’d lost the element of surprise and he knew that going into the dense woods after this man, who was also armed with a rifle, would be a dangerous game indeed. He hadn’t seen the woman that he knew was there, but her tracks were everywhere on the beach and the man he’d shot at had been calling out to someone. He and Myron and Delbert had apparently gotten back to the island in the nick of time. The people from the big catamaran clearly knew the woman and her dead husband. If they had found her sooner, she would be long gone already. The woman’s story may not reach anyone that mattered, considering the state of things in the islands right now, but Sidney, like Myron, would rather not have to answer to anyone about it. There was no telling when things would get back to normal, if ever, but if they did, there could be consequences for the shooting of the woman’s stupid husband, especially since they’d opened fire on her too, and she was unarmed. The easiest way to remedy that potential future problem was to make sure none of them left the island alive. If he hadn’t so royally screwed up the wonderful opportunity that had fallen into his lap with his impatience, half of their problem would be solved already. Sidney had no doubt that Myron and Delbert would take care of the other half at the anchorage, and maybe already had.

  Sidney considered his options as he stood there staring at the place where the man had entered the woods. The stranger would no doubt try to take the woman back to the anchorage where the boats were waiting, but he would be unaware that Myron and Delbert were already there. Sidney wondered if he should turn back quickly and go tell his friends they would be coming, or if it would be better to try and set up an ambush for the man and woman somewhere along the way. But the problem with the latter was that he couldn’t know for sure which route they would take. He knew enough about the island to know that they would find the going difficult and slow anywhere there was no trail or road. Sidney didn’t think there was a path that led back to the cove where the boats were anchored, but he didn’t know that for sure. Even if there were, it would take them longer to get there than it would for him to cut back the way he came to get Myron and Delbert. They had come here prepared to hunt the woman down and they could better follow through with that plan if the three of them worked together. The other boat and the Americans on board hadn’t been part of that plan, but Sidney was confident that the one they’d found on board was no longer a threat. He hadn’t heard any gunshots from where he was, but that didn’t mean anything. The sound of the wind and surf on the east side of the island would have drowned out shots from that distance, and anyway, Myron may have dispatched the man in a different manner.

  When he reached the ruins, Sidney gave them a wide berth. It would be a perfect place for someone to set up an ambush and it made him nervous, even though he doubted there was anyone else on the island but the one man he’d shot at and the woman. If he thought they might double back this way, he could use the castle for his own ambush spot, but he doubted they would. The man would be much more cautious after the near miss, even if it did mean bushwhacking through a hellhole of thorns and thickets.

  He picked his way through the woods around the ruins and then followed the road back to the trail he’d followed here, the one with the fresh machete cuts that led back to the anchorage. He would pick up Myron and Delbert in the skiff and bring them to that side of the island. Maybe he would drop one of them off farther north along the shoreline, and leave the other waiting in hiding among the palms overlooking the beach. One way or another they would get them; either when the man attempted to return to the boats with the woman or if they had to hunt them down and flush them out of the bush. Sidney smiled as he quickened his pace. He felt better about things now, even though he’d messed up earlier. He would get another chance, and the whole operation might even turn out to be fun; a hunting trip with higher stakes than just a search for an unarmed woman.

  By the time he reached the palm grove behind the beach where he’d left the skiff, Sidney was almost running. The sailboats had swung to an angle that put them beam-on to his view due to the change of the tide in the anchorage, and he saw no one on deck of the catamaran. The owner had likely taken his final swim and Myron and Delbert were probably down below, ransacking the two cabins. Sidney imagined there were lots of valuable things aboard the bigger boat, and he had no doubt his friends would pocket anything small enough they could hide from him while he was away. With these wealthy American yachtsmen, that could be a lot: expensive watches and other jewelry… drugs… cash… and even gold coins that some of them liked to stash away for emergency purposes. It was highly possible that his two buddies would get the best of it, but Sidney knew too that there was enough useful loot aboard a boat that size that they couldn’t hide it all. And besides, they had the boat as well. That was worth a lot, whether they used it for their own purposes or traded it for a more suitable craft.

  Sidney hurried across the beach to the skiff and put his rifle inside. The tide had dropped enough that it was going to take some effort to get it back in the water. Even as he began pushing, he called out to his friends, telling them what was going on:

  “MYRON! DELBERT! I NEED YOUR HELP! DE MAN FROM DE CANOE ON DE BEACH IS WITH DE WOMAN ON DE ISLAND!”

  Seventeen

  LARRY HAD ROLLED ONTO his side facing the cabin when Jessica went back below to look for the handcuff keys. He hated the helpless feeling of having his hands behind his back, unable to defend himself or Jessica. But he was unspeaka
bly proud of her. Weeks ago, when she and Casey and Grant had first come aboard the boat, he wouldn’t have thought she had it in her. But Jessica had proven that she was a survivor and a fighter. She had taken the initiative and without hesitation did what had to be done. Both of them were alive because of her, and her alone. But he was still helpless and getting more anxious by the minute to have his wrists unlocked.

  “What’s taking so long, Jessica?”

  “I’m trying, Larry. There’s nothing on his belt but a pistol. They’re not in his back pockets either. I’m trying to move him so I can look in his front pockets.”

  Larry knew it wouldn’t be easy. The dead man had to weigh close to two hundred pounds, and he’d fallen into the narrow space at the foot of the companionway ladder where the cabin sole was less than two feet wide. There was no room to simply roll a limp body over in there. Jessica would have to somehow lift and turn all that weight to get to the man’s front pockets, and there wasn’t a damned thing Larry could do to help. When he suddenly heard a shout from the beach and realized it was the third man from the skiff, the situation took on an entirely new urgency. He wasn’t sure if Jessica heard it or not from down there, so he called to her, keeping his voice low enough that it wouldn’t carry to the beach.

  “Jessica! Get up here! Keep your head down though and bring your rifle! Hurry!” He saw her face appear a second later in the drop board opening under the hatch.