Finders Keepers

by Shirl Henke

  “Is there a stairscase…” Sam paused to gulp in a long breath of clean air, then continued, “down from here?”

  Still coughing and struggling to breathe, Tess shook her head.

  “We’ll have to climb down,” Sam said, looking at the windows all around the big house. Flames were shooting out of both stories. “Any shrubs, vines, whatever?” she asked as she checked the railing.

  “No, just a couple of small mimosas over there.”

  Sam looked down at the fragile lacy branches. The top of the tallest one barely reached the deck floor. Then she saw a flower bed freshly turned for an early summer replanting. “Here we go. Just follow me.”

  She demonstrated, casting off the wet towel and throwing it onto the softened earth below. Then she climbed over the railing and lowered herself from the deck floor. Her feet were still a good five or six yards above the ground. She let go and dropped with knees bent to absorb some of the shock. Luckily, she didn’t twist any joints when she landed, although she did lose her balance and hit the ground. Years of martial arts practice had taught her to roll in a ball and use her left arm to slap out and absorb the force of the landing.

  “Come on, Tess. I can see the fire heading our way through the atrium windows,” she yelled up.

  Tess threw her towel down and did her best to emulate Sam. When she hit the ground, Sam was there to steady her before she tumbled backwards, but she let out a hiss of pain as her right ankle turned on impact.

  “Let me help you,” Sam said, throwing the taller woman’s arm across her shoulder and practically dragging her clear of the burning house. They didn’t get a few yards away before the glass windows of the sunroom behind them blew outward, sending shards of glass in every direction.

  “We have to call the police and tell them about Alexi,” Tess said. “I’m all right now,” she added. Though her teeth were gritted in pain, she started to jog without Sam’s help.

  “Let’s just get the hell out of here before he realizes he didn’t finish us and comes back to try again,” Sam replied.

  “We can call from Kit’s place.”

  Sam considered. It was logical. How far could Renkov have gotten? She hadn’t been able to hear the sound of a boat or a car taking off through the soundproofed room and roar of the fire. He could be anywhere by now. “Okay. You sure you can make it?”

  “I’d crawl through that broken glass over there just to see Alexi Renkov behind bars,” Tess replied gamely.

  The women ran around hedges and cut through lush landscaping on the waterfront estates until they could see Kit Steele’s place. And Kit. She was at the dock, climbing aboard her fifty-foot Tiara yacht. She tossed a heavy satchel on the deck. Then Sam saw Matt stand up in front of her. He threw something in the water. Neither woman could tell what it was from the angle where they stood. But the weapon she was pointing directly at him was clearly visible.

  “What on earth—”

  “She’s Alexi’s partner in this scam,” Sam said, cursing herself for not figuring it out sooner. She wished fervently she’d been able to retrieve her fanny pack with the gun inside. Of course there was the matter of wasting precious time in the black smoke looking for it when every second counted. Before she could think any further, Kit backed Matt into the lower cabin. Then she fired inside and slammed the door.

  Sam’s heart stopped beating. Had she killed him? No, Sam couldn’t imagine it. Surely she’d know if Matt were dead. Be alive, you big lug! I haven’t told you I love you!

  Kit quickly climbed to the steering station and started up the boat. Almost immediately, they could see Alexi stand up beside her, rubbing his neck.

  “He and Kit are quarreling,” Tess said, afraid to venture what must have happened to Matt.

  Just then, Kit Steele raised the gun she’d used on Matt, but Alexi twisted it out of her hand and gave her a hard slap. She fell backward a few steps, then dropped down. Almost instantly a small pop echoed on the water. Alexi crumpled back to the deck.

  “Some lovers’ spat,” Sam said as Kit pulled the Tiara away from the dock and headed south on the Intracoastal. “She’s making a run for it and Matt may be bleeding to death in that damned cabin! I need a phone to call the Coast Guard. Any neighbors around here likely to be home?”

  Tess shook her head. “I doubt it this time of day, but she can’t get away. Even with low tide, she can’t make it under the Venetian Causeway in a boat that big. She’ll have to radio ahead and ask them to raise the bridge. That could take a while if no other boats are in line.”

  “Given her situation, I doubt she’s going to wait,” Sam said grimly. “If she gets out to the open sea, Matt’s as dead as yesterday’s lunch meat. We have to catch up with her.”

  “We can! Alexi’s Cigarette. Come on! It’s a thirty-nine foot Top Gun Unlimited,” Tess said, turning back toward her burning home. “The keys are in the boathouse. I know where he keeps them.”

  “Just get me close enough to the Tiara to jump aboard and I’ll take it from there,” Sam said. The two women made a run for the boathouse.

  Once inside, Tess quickly retrieved the keys to Alexi’s favorite speedboat and fired it up. “Hold on,” Tess said as she maneuvered the long, sleek craft out onto the open water and let it rip.

  “How fast can this thing go?” Sam asked, looking with frustration at the disassembled radio. Kit had done a good job throwing them off the trail when she’d helped Tess tear it apart, supposedly searching for papers she already possessed.

  Tess grinned grimly. “In miles—eighty-five, maybe faster. Alexi had it specially outfitted, like I told you. He worshipped speed. We can catch that yacht, no sweat. She can’t get under the Venetian, but what will we do then? She has a gun and we’ve seen she’s willing to use it.” If there was any regret for Alexi’s possible death, Tess didn’t feel it. She tried not to think about the man she knew Sam loved.

  “I’ll figure out something. Just get me close enough to jump aboard,” Sam replied, not all as confident as she made out to be.

  The Cigarette took off like a rocket, flying over the gentle waves of the Intracoastal Waterway. Never a sailor, Sam held on to the seat for dear life. Although she could drive a semi down a mountainside at seventy-five, anything faster than a rowboat on water gave her the willies. But Matt was a prisoner on Kit Steele’s yacht, maybe slowly bleeding…or even dying as she headed for the open ocean. Once Kit was in the clear, she’d get rid of Alexi and Matt. Dear God, Sam had to stop the bitch!

  Some great bodyguard you turned out to be! For once in her mercenary life, Sam Ballanger was willing to let Aunt Claudia keep every damned cent of her fee if only she could see Matt Granger grin at her again. She said a silent prayer to St. Jude, even promised to start going to church again if the patron saint of impossible requests spared Matt’s life.

  Tess was good. She hadn’t been bragging when she said she’d learned to handle all of her husband’s customized toys. “Watch her make it under Kennedy,” Tess said as the Tiara approached the first causeway she’d have to get past to reach open ocean.

  The big yacht glided under the causeway with room to spare. Kit, too, was daring and skilled handling a boat, but the Cigarette was gaining on the slower Tiara in spite of its souped-up engines. The day was cool and slightly overcast. Few pleasure craft were out on the water. Kit didn’t have to negotiate any traffic.

  “Wouldn’t you know it. Not a Coast Guard or Harbor Patrol boat in sight,” Sam said with an oath as the two boats raced madly southward. Tess put the Cigarette between the pilings of Kennedy Causeway.

  “Uh-oh, I think she’s spotted us,” Tess said as Kit turned around. In response, Kit throttled up and the Tiara lunged forward. They narrowed the distance gradually now, not as fast as when Steele hadn’t known she was being chased. “Alexi had work done on the Tiara, put in bigger engines. It belongs to Mikhail and she used it to run errands for him.”

  “So, you still sure you can catch it?” Sam asked.

>   “Absolutely. He fine-tuned this baby, too,” Tess replied grimly.

  Sam leaned forward in her seat, willing their craft to catch up. Visions of Matt’s bloody corpse made her shake. She forced the thought aside. They raced endlessly over the blue-gray waters as the sun and clouds vied for dominance. The wind whipped her hair in her eyes as she squinted at the yacht in the distance.

  “She’s coming up on I-95,” Tess said as the big interstate causeway loomed ahead of them, filled with its usual stream of cars coming and going between Miami Beach and the mainland.

  Again the Tiara made it through the pilings without incident. Sam tried not to look at the heavy concrete sides of the passage when their fragile craft shot through a few moments later. “We’re gaining on her!” she said excitedly.

  “Next comes the real test. She’ll have to turn around at the Venetian,” Tess said. “We can clear it but she can’t. Somebody has to radio to raise the bridge. If she does and waits, we’ll have her.”

  “Oh, I’ll have her all right,” Sam said, picturing her hands around that sun-gilded, elegant throat, choking the life out of Kit Steele.

  “Damn!” Tess muttered as the bridge started to rise. A small SeaVee 310 fishing boat had radioed to the bridge man. It waited patiently as the huge steel grated arms rose, slow and graceful. “She’s crazy!” Tess yelled, appalled as Kit came flying directly behind the SeaVee, intent on cutting it off and making it under the bridge.

  “I knew she’d try running it somehow. She’s not crazy, just desperate,” Sam said. “She’s sitting on millions and just shot two men.”

  “She could crash and blow up both boats,” Tess said.

  “What’s she got to lose?” Sam asked. But she knew what she had to lose. Matt! He was trapped below in the cabin, near the engines and gas tanks, maybe bleeding to death. He counted more than the fortune Kit had stashed aboard the damned yacht.

  As Tess drew the Cigarette near, they watched the scene play out. The SeaVee, seeing the much larger Tiara bearing down on it at a faster rate than that kind of yacht was supposed to be able to run, tried desperately to get out of the way. It was clear that she intended to take advantage of the open bridge. Apparently the gateman also was aware of it and started to lower the bridge.

  “Why the hell is he doing that? He could kill them,” Tess said over the roar of the motor. She floored the racing craft, which was now bouncing more above water than on it as they watched Kit approach the causeway. The smaller fishing boat cut sharply to port and circled, bouncing like a cork in the wake of the Tiara as it flew toward the lowering drawbridge.

  They watched in horror as the Tiara approached the narrow chute. Sam forgot to breathe. Living in Miami, she’d seen on television news what happened when a big boat with full gasoline tanks crashed at high speed. She alternately prayed and swore as Kit Steele buckled down to her deadly task.

  Steele almost made it before the bridge came down. Then they saw why the engineer had lowered the gate. On the south side another yacht, an Azimut, drew near in a dissecting course. It had the right of way to pass by the causeway but Kit wouldn’t veer from her break for freedom.

  “They’re going to crash,” Sam breathed.

  The Tiara hit the chute but could not quite reach the other side before the two halves of the bridge lowered into place. The heavy steel sheared off the top of the Tiara’s flybridge. Big chunks of metal and fiberglass ripped away as quickly as an ape could peel a banana. The sunroof, GPS station and satellite television box flew in all directions, crashing against the pilings, plunking into the water. The impact of hitting the bridge threw the Tiara to one side where it sliced against the concrete chute. Sparks flew like fireworks on the Fourth of July.

  “It could blow apart any second!” Tess yelled as they sped toward the causeway.

  Sam couldn’t close her eyes but she did pray harder than she had since she was a five-year-old girl in Boston and her grandfather lay dying. She watched as the Tiara cleared the bridge and kept on going—directly toward the Azimut. The much larger yacht pulled forward in a desperate attempt to avoid being broadsided. The sound of horns filled the air.

  Chapter 21

  At the very last second, the two yachts missed each other by a coat of paint. The Tiara held its course dead south but the Azimut’s wake rocked the smaller craft. Sam and Tess could see Kit Steele fighting to hold the wheel. Then amazingly, she regained control and picked up speed.

  “She doesn’t have navigation or radio but I doubt she’s taking on water, either,” Tess said as they continued the mad chase.

  “I can’t believe that thing’s still afloat,” Sam said, swallowing hard and fighting the first bout of motion sickness she’d ever experienced in her life. Then she realized it wasn’t the speed or the narrowness of the chute as they passed under the causeway that created her misery. It was fear for Matt, pure and simple.

  “You think that guy who lowered the bridge will call the Coast Guard?” Sam asked.

  “You bet, but they have a lot of water to cover and not enough manpower. If she slips south past the Rickenbacker, she’ll avoid the Government Cut where their station is located. Whether or not they can catch her will depend on where their patrols happen to be right now—if one’s even out.”

  “She’ll head straight to Bimini. There’s an international airport there,” Sam said, thinking out loud as she held on to her seat while they flew across the waves.

  “We’re gaining on her,” Tess said. “I know I can catch her, but what do we do then?”

  “I’m working on it. Just get me to that bitch,” Sam said.

  Kit cleared the MacArthur Causeway in moments. To their right Bicentennial Park was a blur as they pursued her at breakneck speed. The Tiara crossed through the always-open railroad drawbridge south of it and flew around Dodge Island.

  “She’s avoiding the Government Cut, just like I thought, even though it’s a quicker way to reach the open sea,” Tess said.

  “Then she’ll go under the Rickenbacker and past Key Biscayne to lessen her chances of any water-patrolling boats seeing her,” Sam replied.

  “Yes, it’s wide open. We’d better stop her before she rounds the tip of the key,” Tess said, looking down at the gas gauge. “We’re losing fuel. Alexi must’ve forgotten to tell Norge to repair a fuel tank leak.”

  “Great,” Sam muttered. “Can you coax any more out of this toy before it gives out?”

  In reply, Tess bore down. They were narrowing the distance as Kit followed the channel, veering east to avoid Brickell Key. The long sleek rise of the Rickenbacker Causeway loomed in the distance. “Okay, it’s leveling out now. Maybe a faulty gauge. I can’t tell.”

  “Just give it everything you’ve got. Matt’s aboard and injured.”

  Neither woman would voice aloud the fear that Kit might already have killed him.

  “I can trim time she can’t risk. The Tiara draws deep enough to force her to stay in the main channel. We don’t have to with this little baby,” Tess said.

  “We’ve barely touched the water since this race began. I believe you,” Sam answered, her mind busy turning over various ways to board the yacht and keep Kit Steele from shooting her like a sitting duck.

  The Tiara shot under the last causeway and swung southeast to round the large man-made keys of Virginia and Biscayne. They drew within a hundred feet, fifty, twenty… Sam came up with a plan—not much of one but all she could think of—if Tess could pull it off.

  “I don’t think she can take her hands off the wheel long enough to turn around and use her gun. Can you pull alongside so I can jump on board? Then if you dart ahead and spin across her bow, you could create a wake to occupy her while I climb the stairs to get at her.”

  Clutching the wheel of the Cigarette, Tess nodded grimly. “You betcha.”

  Sam climbed to the backseat of the long narrow craft and waited her chance, her eyes on the Tiara when suddenly, Alexi reappeared. Sam’s eyes widened as she saw him
hold up a gun, forcing Kit to let go of the wheel and knock his hand aside. The pair struggled over the gun while the yacht turned erratically, then veered sharply to starboard.

  Inside the cabin of the Tiara, Matt was thrown against the shower stall in the head. What the hell was going on? The cabin started to spin like a dreidel at Hanukkah and he braced himself, a hand on each side of the narrow compartment. His right side ached like someone held an acetylene torch to it, but he’d been lucky. When Kit fired into the cabin, he’d anticipated her move and spun sideways just enough to keep the bullet from hitting dead center.

  He’d spent the past twenty minutes of the insane ride alternately passing out, bleeding over the plush interior and attempting to locate the first-aid kit. He’d found it and, after several tries, he’d made a temporary binding that slowed the bleeding. Then he began searching the bedroom and kitchen. Earlier, during his first bout of unconsciousness, he’d awakened to the scream of metal being torn off the craft and seen the flash of fire when they were nearly crushed under the Venetian Causeway.

  He figured the Coast Guard or Harbor Patrol were in pursuit. Each time he was tossed against a wall or over a piece of furniture, that hope kept him searching for a weapon he could use to break down the door. He’d tried his shoulder until it ached like hell. The damned boat was built like a brick house and he was too weak from blood loss to make a dent in anything stronger than cellophane.

  Hearing a struggle overhead, he decided to look out a porthole and see if the authorities were closing in. To his horror, he saw Tess and Sam in a damned featherweight Cigarette pulling alongside. His desperation increased tenfold when he saw the way Sam was hunched on the edge of the backseat. She was going to jump aboard! Kit would shoot Sam before she could reach the flybridge. Sam appeared unarmed. He had to do something before she was killed! But what?