Cayman Crackdown (Coastal Fury Book 18)

by Matt Lincoln

  It was a bizarre getup, and I couldn’t help but think that all he needed to do was throw on an eyepatch, and he’d look exactly like a pirate out of a movie.

  “You gonna throw another grenade at us?” Hills jeered as he kept his pistol trained on the man. Viper reached behind his back as if to answer Hills’s question, but Hills fired again before he could draw anything.

  This shot landed, striking Viper in the thigh, and sending him tumbling to the ground. However, the fall didn’t stop Viper from drawing his gun, which he aimed at Hills before pulling the trigger.

  It clicked uselessly, and it was almost funny watching Viper’s eyes grow wide with horror and disbelief as he repeatedly pulled the trigger to no avail.

  “Ha!” Hills snorted as he looked down at Viper with contempt, holstering his gun and pulling a set of handcuffs off of his belt. “What an anti-climactic end. I’m almost disappointed.”

  As he took a step forward, I noticed Viper’s arm moving. I couldn’t see what he was doing since he was lying on top of it, so it took me a moment to remember about the other gun. The one with the long, curved wooden handle that was so old it probably wasn’t capable of actually shooting.

  “Stop!” I shoved Hills down to the ground just as Viper whipped out the other gun and fired. To my surprise, it actually went off, the hammer of the flintlock striking home. A flash of fire and smoke erupted out of the long, thin barrel as it did, along with the thunderous sound of a black powder weapon, but the shot went wide.

  Now that it was out of the holster, I could see that it was definitely old, not some pirate aficionado's recreation. Probably a few hundred years, though it was hard to tell exactly from this distance. I tensed as he pointed it at us again and pulled the trigger, but nothing happened. The gun twitched and recoiled slightly, but, thankfully, nothing actually came out.

  Viper roared with anger before tossing the thing down and scrambling away from us.

  “Don’t move!” I yelled as I got back onto my feet. However, before I could reach him, Viper suddenly rolled to the side with alarming speed directly toward the edge of the ship.

  “Stop!” Hills called as he got back up as well, bringing his gun up to point it at Viper. To my shock, Viper just continued to roll, squeezing beneath the flexible wire railing at the edge of the ship and falling down into the water.

  Hills swore out loud as the two of us rushed to look over the railing just as Viper landed with a splash next to an inflated emergency life raft. It suddenly dawned on me what the earlier splashing noise had been and why Viper had been holding onto a rope when we’d found him. He had just finished launching an emergency life raft when we arrived and interrupted him.

  Velasquez’s head popped through the surface of the water just seconds later, and he began to swim toward the raft quickly. I quickly brought one foot up onto the second-highest wire on the railing, ready to jump off after him.

  “You can’t be serious,” Hills gaped at me before looking back down at Viper. “Ugh, I’m so sick of water.”

  He looked so upset that I thought he might stay behind, but a moment later, he was climbing up over the railing as well. I turned back and lifted my left leg over the side before pushing off with as much force as I could.

  The water hit me like a wall of needles as I plunged several feet down, the world around me quickly going dark as I descended lower into the ocean’s depths. I got his bearings as quickly as I could and kicked back toward the surface. I couldn’t waste any time, lest Velasquez manage to get to the boat and escape.

  I gasped as I came back up to the surface, inhaling large lungfuls of air as I twisted and turned in search of Viper, or Hills, who had jumped down a little after me. I spotted Hills first, about twenty feet away in the water. I had no idea how we’d managed to land so far away from each other after jumping from the same point.

  I spotted Viper next, just a few feet away, clearly struggling to move with one of his legs injured but still covering the distance to the raft surprisingly quickly. I rushed after him, swimming through the tumultuous water as fast as I could manage. My lungs were burning from the exertion, but no matter how hard I inhaled, I couldn’t seem to catch my breath.

  “You’re not going anywhere,” I sneered as I caught up to Velasquez and locked one arm around his neck. The pirate growled as he struggled to get free, twisting around and striking at me wildly with both fists.

  I hissed as one of his blows managed to land hard enough against the side of my head that, for a moment, I saw stars, and my vision blurred slightly. Viper took full advantage of my momentary weakness. He spun around to face me before using both hands to bear down on my shoulders, shoving me beneath the water.

  I unintentionally swallowed a large mouthful of seawater before he had a chance to hold my breath. It felt like my lungs were being stabbed with needles, and the stars dancing in my vision were only getting worse. I reached up and gripped Velasquez’s arms with my fists, pushing up against him in an attempt to get him off. I knew if I stayed down here even a few seconds longer, I was going to drown.

  Suddenly the pressure was gone, and I rushed back up to the surface, desperately inhaling air the moment I was above water again. I turned to find Hills punching Viper furiously across the face, evidently having been the one to get him off of me.

  Velasquez glared at Hills and lunged toward him, but before he could get close, I used my leg to kick at his injured side. Under the water, it was difficult to put a lot of force behind the blow, but evidently, it was enough, judging by the way Velasquez howled with pain. I immediately moved in to punch him in the face, directly in the nose. It crunched into an awkward angle and immediately began to spew blood, but I didn’t stop, punching him again and again until the pirate leader was only semi-conscious and groaning faintly.

  “Take his other arm,” Hills instructed as he grabbed one of Viper’s shoulders. Between the two of us, we dragged his limp form over to the life raft, both of us breathing raggedly as we did so.

  Hills climbed up into the raft first before turning around and reaching down to pull Viper up. I gritted my teeth as I pushed from below. My hands were shaking, and my breathing was still coming in short, painful rasps.

  I climbed up after we’d successfully gotten Viper inside. He was still dazed, so we quickly worked together to cuff his hands behind his back.

  “This too,” Hills grumbled as he yanked the length of rope that was still connected to the raft out of the water where it was floating. I watched as he tied Viper up in it. It might have seemed like overkill, but we really couldn’t take any chances until he was safely in custody back on solid land.

  Speaking of which, I thought as I rummaged through the supplies inside the raft. These things came pre-equipped with emergency supplies, so there should be a way to signal our distress somewhere in here. I kept rifling through the small containers inside the raft, tossing things aside until I finally found what he was looking for: a small box containing emergency distress flares.

  I grabbed two of the thick orange sticks and leaned out of the side of the life raft before unscrewing the bottom cap to reveal the thin deployment string inside. I pulled on it hard, wincing as I did and wondering why it seemed to take so much effort. I’d set off flares before. Why was this such a problem? It finally went off with a bang, rocketing high up into the air with a whoosh.

  I frowned as he watched it soar up into the sky, barely visible in the daylight, especially among all the smoke that was already filling the air because of the flaming pirate ship. I launched the second one, hopeful that the Coasties were paying enough attention to notice us over here on the opposite side of where they were stationed.

  For a few seconds, nothing happened, and I was about to go grab some more flares when a loud rumbling noise reached my ear. Just seconds later, one of those small, orange Coast Guard boats came skidding around the edge of the ship, practically bouncing across the water as it raced toward the life raft.

  Thank goo
dness, I thought to myself as I finally allowed myself to relax. I’d been worried that the small light of the flares might go unnoticed, but the Coasties obviously knew what they were doing.

  “Are you okay?” Hills suddenly asked me. “You don’t sound good.”

  “I don’t sound good?” I asked, or rather wheezed because I could barely get any words out. It was only then that I realized I was actually making a really alarming noise with every breath I took. In fact, despite the fact that I’d finally sat down to take a rest, my breathing wasn’t coming any easier. In fact, it was getting worse.

  I tried to breathe more deeply, but it was in vain. I began to get light-headed as I desperately sucked in air, only for nothing to get through. It felt as though I was suffocating or drowning.

  “Whoa, okay, calm down,” Hills suggested as the world began to spin. I could hear the panic in his voice as I fell down onto the floor of the life raft. He was yelling now, a long stream of obscenities flowing out of his mouth as he called for someone to come help, the Coast Guard, presumably.

  I tried to sit up but I couldn’t. My chest hurt so badly I could barely think.

  “He’s turning blue!” someone above me yelled. It might have been Hills’s voice, but it was so garbled I couldn’t tell.

  My thoughts turned to mush as the seconds passed, and the world around me began to grow dim, but one, in particular, stood out at the forefront. As I drifted off, I found myself desperately hoping that this wasn’t the end. I couldn’t die yet.

  I still hadn’t found the Dragon’s Rogue.

  35

  Charlie

  “I hope Wallace fires you,” Junior grumbled as he aggressively pulled another potato chip out of the bag that Charlie brought him from the vending machine back at the hospital. They’d just come back to the police station after visiting Marston and Holm in the hospital. Holm had been okay after some stitches but had naturally elected to stay with his partner. Marston was still out cold.

  Apparently, having one of your bones puncture your own lung was a pretty serious deal.

  Charlie’s partner, on the other hand, was pissed off over the way Charlie had suddenly run off to help Marston the moment the Coast Guard officers had arrived. Usually, Junior was the kind to forgive and forget pretty easily. The kid didn’t hold grudges, so it surprised Charlie that he was still sulking, even while he shoveled the chips into his mouth.

  Charlie sighed as he sat down next to his partner, who was sitting in an empty room inside the police station as they waited for Velasquez to be prepped for the interrogation. He’d been released from the hospital a little earlier, and last they’d heard, they were in the middle of processing him so that Charlie and Junior could question him.

  “If he did fire me,” Charlie huffed, “then who would you work with?”

  “Miranda,” Junior replied without hesitation as he took another chip out of the bag.

  “Ha!” Charlie scoffed. “How would that be any different? She's even more unpredictable than I am.”

  Junior paused for a moment as he considered Charlie’s argument.

  “Yeah, I guess you’re right,” he muttered as he shot Charlie a dark look.

  “Will you stop it already?” Charlie frowned at him. “Come on. I couldn’t just leave Marston to fend for himself. What would have happened if I hadn’t been there to pull Viper off of him when he was trying to drown him?”

  “Obviously, it was good you were there,” Junior grumbled in response, “but would it kill you to give people some warning about what you’re thinking once in a while? Instead of just doing whatever occurs to you?

  “I couldn’t let Velasquez get away,” Charlie argued back insistently. “I’m not going to stop following my instincts. Hesitating is how people get themselves killed.”

  “I know,” Junior sighed as he lifted the bag to tip over the last of the crumbs into his mouth. “You’re right. It’s just not a nice feeling knowing your partner’s facing certain death alone somewhere. You should know that, considering you made that poor pilot land your helicopter in the middle of the boat after our helicopter crashed.”

  “We didn’t make him land it,” Charlie retorted. “We just asked him to bring it close enough so we could jump out. And it wasn’t just me. Marston told him to do it, too.”

  “You’re both dumb,” Junior mumbled as he crumpled up the empty bag of chips and stood up.

  “Thanks,” Charlie replied flatly as he followed suit and got up from his chair. “You’re welcome, by the way, for pulling you out of a burning helicopter.

  “Yeah, yeah, thanks,” Junior replied with a smirk. “Come on, let’s go see if we can talk to Velasquez yet. I want to get back to the hospital to see how Marston is doing.”

  “We just got back from there,” Charlie replied as he followed Junior out of the room and down the hall that led to Leeland’s office.

  “I know,” Junior replied, “but I still feel bad. Out of all of us, he got hurt the worst. And the reason he got hurt was because he was saving us from getting blown up. I want to make sure he’s completely okay.”

  Charlie hadn’t forgotten about the way that Marston had saved all three of them. Not many men had the stones to run toward a grenade like that. Junior was right. As soon as they finished talking with Velasquez, they’d head back to see him again.

  They were almost to Leeland’s office when the door opened, and Leeland himself stepped out.

  “Oh, agents,” he greeted them as he saw them walking toward him. “I was just about to come to speak to you.”

  “Velasquez is ready?” Charlie asked, his heart rate increasing with excitement at the thought.

  “He is,” Leeland replied. “Though I should warn you he has not been particularly forthcoming with any information. You might have some difficulty getting him to reveal anything.”

  “Nothing we haven’t dealt with before,” Charlie replied confidently.

  “Well, I’m glad to hear that,” Leeland replied. “If you’re ready then, I can escort the two of you down there. Officer Finch won’t be joining today, as I’d rather oversee this particular interrogation myself.”

  The two agents followed the sergeant down to the interrogation room they’d now visited twice before. It felt a little strange for it to suddenly just be the two of them. With the Miami agents in the hospital and their liaison now gone as well, it suddenly felt like they were missing someone. Their absence only reawakened the fury that Charlie felt toward Velasquez. He was the reason they weren’t here, after all.

  Velasquez was sitting calmly at the table on the other side of the glass when Charlie and Junior entered the interrogation room behind Leeland. He didn’t look panicked or scared, like a lot of criminals did when they found themselves in handcuffs, sitting inside a police station. He didn’t look happy either, though. The only emotion Charlie could read from him was pure anger, radiating off of him in waves. He could see why the guy had managed to wield such powerful control over so many men, the very energy he gave off, even just sitting there, was intimidating.

  “I’ll wait here,” Leeland stated as he took a seat in one of the chairs in front of the glass. “You two do whatever it is you need to.”

  Don’t tempt me, a vicious part of Charlie’s brain thought. He’d done some fairly questionable things for the sake of closing a case in the past. He was no stranger to bending the rules, and after all the pain Velasquez had caused, the urge to hurt him back was fierce.

  Nevertheless, he reigned himself in. He needed to do this right if they were going to make Velasquez face justice the right way. He looked over at Junior for silent confirmation that he was ready before pushing open the door and stepping into the smaller room.

  Velasquez looked up at Charlie as he approached, the corners of his mouth twisting down slightly into a frown.

  “Yeah, remember me?” Charlie raised an eyebrow at him as he sat heavily into one of the chairs. “That was some show you put on back there. How are your inj
uries, by the way?”

  “Screw you,” Velasquez hissed as he glared at Charlie. His face was battered and bruised, and one of his eyes was swollen shut. Charlie had evidently done quite the number on him when he was punching him back in the water.

  “Great,” Charlie barreled on, completely ignoring Velasquez’s barb. “Well, since I know, we both have places we’d rather be, why don’t you just tell us what we want to know, and we’ll be on our way?”

  Velasquez snorted in response but didn’t say anything and just looked off to the side, clearly avoiding looking back at Charlie.

  “They never make it easy, do they?” Charlie turned to look at Junior, who shrugged.

  “It’s a common survival instinct in dumb, wild animals,” Junior replied nonchalantly, deliberately putting emphasis on the last three words. “It’s essentially the same as playing dead. Pretend the threat isn’t there and just hold still until it goes away.”

  “What did you just say?” Velasquez spat, his hands balled into tight fists. Honestly, Charlie was a bit surprised that Junior’s insult had worked. It had sounded a bit too over-the-top to Charlie, but apparently, Velasquez had a thinner skin than he’d expected. “As if I’d consider the two of you a threat.”

  “Well, the way I see it,” Charlie jeered, “you’re the one sitting in an interrogation room wearing a pair of handcuffs. I’d say we’re currently the bigger threat here.”

  “I’ll kill you,” Velasquez snarled as he leaned across the table, spittle flying from his mouth as he glared at the two agents.

  “Yeah, I don’t think you will,” Charlie replied flatly. “Anyway, if we could get back to the questions? And don’t bother playing dumb. Your mom and brother pretty much told us everything already.”

  Velasquez’s jaw dropped at that, his mouth hanging open almost comically for a moment before he snapped it back shut again with a painful-sounding click.

  “That stupid hag!” he roared. “Who does she think she is?”