by Jeff Ross
Kevin winked at me. “She’s hot.”
“Yeah, and back to you, Kevin. What about your parents’ life insurance?”
“I’ve been giving it all to Delgado to help finish the hotel. But I can only take out a certain amount every month. So it may be a couple of weeks before we can get the construction going again. And then I’ll get to see my parents.”
“Kevin, how do you even know that…?”
He stared at me. “That my parents are alive?”
“Yeah.”
“I just know, Luca. I just know. Delgado says it’s better if I don’t see them. There was too much heat from the investigation. When the construction is done and the investigators have figured out what actually happened with my dad’s business, then we can be together again.”
“So you are certain…?”
“Luca,” Kevin said. He leaned against the tree and stared at the ground. His hair had grown out and dangled in front of his face. “What else am I supposed to believe?” He spun around and looked back out at the break.
Alana came up from the beach and approached the log. “Are you two okay?”
“Yeah, but could you go out and see if Esme and Delgado are still at the break?” I asked.
“Sure.” She tilted her head to one side. “Are you coming with me?”
“No, I need to stay here,” I said, handing her the key.
Kevin looked at me again. “I’m not going anywhere. You caught me.”
Alana took off toward the water. A moment later she was bouncing out toward the break on her Jet Ski.
“It all makes sense,” Kevin said. “You have to admit it does.”
“I guess,” I said, but I was skeptical. I knew Kevin’s dad, and he never would have run from a fight. Not even one with federal investigators. He loved LA. I couldn’t see him chucking everything, including his only son, to run away from an investigation. “Do you have any proof they’re alive, Kevin? Anything at all?”
He banged his chest. “I know it, Luca. They’re here.”
Alana disappeared behind the waves. I felt a tinge of panic for her. The waves were big, and it wasn’t easy to steer a Jet Ski through them.
“Why did you run away from us?” I asked.
“Delgado said not to speak to anyone for a while. He said anyone might have been sent to investigate me and the plane crash. This is a big money thing.”
“I don’t doubt it.” I spotted Alana coming back in from the other break. She must have gone out one side, then cut across and searched the other line as well. She pulled the Jet Ski up to the beach.
“You can come out of there,” she called from the shore. “They’re gone.”
“What?” Kevin said. “Crap. He must have seen us together. Now…Where’s Jose? I need to talk to him.” Kevin came around the tree and down onto the beach. He tried to grab the Jet Ski key from Alana.
“He’s not out there either,” Alana said, pulling the key to her stomach.
“Where did he go?” Kevin asked.
Alana stepped away from him. “I don’t know. But all three of them are gone.”
Kevin looked at me, his face blank and beaten. Blood was smeared across his forehead. “Where did they go, Luca?” he said. “What’s happened?”
“I think they’ve got Esme,” I said.
He looked up and down the beach. “Maybe they came in to shore and we didn’t see them. Let’s go to Delgado’s house and see if they’re there.”
chapter seventeen
We moved through the jungle to the edge of the beach in front of Delgado’s hut. Delgado and Jose’s Jet Skis weren’t there, but two boats were.
“Can you see anyone?” Kevin asked.
There wasn’t any movement around Delgado’s. “No,” I said. “Let’s go to my hut. We can see inside Delgado’s from there.” We continued along the edge of the jungle and darted inside my hut.
“There’s no one in Delagado’s,” Alana said.
Kevin looked at me. “Luca, where did they take her?”
I didn’t want to say anything, but it was hard not to point out the obvious. “I have a feeling Delgado isn’t telling you the whole truth,” I said.
“What do you mean?”
“Isn’t it clear? He needs your inheritance to finish the hotel for himself, to run on his own.”
“No, he’s protecting my parents. He’s hiding them from the investigators and helping them finish the hotel. He’s keeping them safe, that’s all.”
“So why would he take Esme?”
Kevin sat down on the bed and put his head in his hands. “I don’t know. Maybe he thinks Esme is here to turn in my parents.” He looked up at us. “We have to wait. He’ll be back. He wants to run the hotel with my parents. It means everything to him.”
“So much that he has taken your parents and Esme hostage?” I said.
Kevin shook his head and scowled. “Not hostage,” he said. “They’re hiding in case someone comes down here to investigate. He’s protecting them, covering for them.”
“It sounds dodgy,” I said, but he didn’t seem to hear me. “Have you even seen any paperwork for the hotel? Are you sure Delgado’s name is on it?”
“They’re at the hotel!” he said. “That’s where Delgado would take Esme. He’s probably just making sure she isn’t a federal investigator or something.” Kevin was up and out the door without another word.
“This is crazy,” Alana said.
“Welcome to my life,” I said as we ran after him.
The hotel was empty. Kevin ran from room to room calling out Esme’s name. He had been camping out in the hotel.
“What now, Kevin?” I said.
“We wait until Jose and Delgado bring Esme here. That’s what will happen,” said Kevin. “They aren’t criminals. They wouldn’t do anything to her.”
“Are you sure?” I asked.
“Yes, Delgado’s not…he’s not like that.”
“Well,” Alana said, “I’m hungry. I’m going to get us some food. You know, just in case they don’t get here for a while.”
She disappeared down the beach toward the village. Kevin and I sat and watched the waves roll in, one after another, in that slow, mesmerizing way they do. It was easy to see why someone would build a hotel here.
“You’ve been living here?” I asked.
“Yeah. In one of the more finished rooms. Jose brings me water and stuff.”
“Why?”
“Why does he bring me water?”
“No, why are you living here? Why not stay at Delgado’s?”
“I wanted to be here in case someone came to look at the hotel. Like a federal investigator or whatever. Then we’d know if anyone was onto it. But no one has shown up yet.”
“I still don’t get why you can’t just be with your parents if they’re hiding out.”
“We have to make sure no one is watching me.”
I looked around at the swaying palm trees and barren beach. If anyone was watching Kevin, they were doing so with an incredible amount of stealth.
Alana returned with a lobster, mahimahi and fresh fruit. We started a fire and cooked everything together in a pot. The sweetness of the fruit blended with the lobster meat and fish. We ate quickly, starving after the energy we’d used on the waves.
“We’ll wait for Jose,” Kevin said every few minutes. “You’ll see, everything will be fine.” I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to say something. “Jose. The same Jose who cut me off in a wave and drove me onto the reef yesterday? He almost killed me. Plus, I trashed my board. That’s when I saw you on the beach.”
“Jose had nothing to do with it,” Kevin said. “He helped drag you to shore.”
“So where was he when I was rammed into the reef?”
“He was surfing. He was…” Kevin looked up at the perfectly blue sky. “No, he was on the other side of the break.”
“No, he dropped in, cut me off and then shot to the other side. Who got to me first?”
“I d
id,” Kevin said. “I was on the beach. I was hoping you would call it a day so I could go back out.”
“And you didn’t notice who blasted me into the reef?”
“No, I must have been in the jungle. Answering the call of nature.”
“Well, it was Jose who drove me into those rocks. I almost died out there,” I said.
“No. Jose wouldn’t do that,” Kevin said, shaking his head.
“Kevin, who are you going to believe? We’ve known each another all our lives.” I ate a bit of lobster and a square of mango and tried to contain my anger.
“It must have been a mistake,” said Kevin. He nodded, agreeing with himself. “It had to be.” He looked out at the dock. The empty lanterns swung in the breeze. “He’ll be here, and he’ll have Esme with him. You’ll see. Everything is going to be good.”
Alana was silent. Eventually she got up and sat at the end of the dock. I followed her out.
“He really believes his parents are here, doesn’t he?” she said.
“Wouldn’t you?”
“I would want to. Sure. But…” She kicked her feet in the water. “What do you think?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I guess it’s possible.”
“Yeah, kind of, in that ‘anything is possible’ way.”
“Maybe.”
“Shouldn’t we be out there looking for Esme?”
I thought about this for a minute. “Even if this whole parents being hidden thing is bogus, I don’t see Delgado as some kind of crazy killer or anything. I’m sure if he has Esme, she’s fine.”
“Sure?” Alana asked.
“As sure as I can be.”
We waited until the afternoon sun descended, and then we walked back up to the hotel.
“I guess they aren’t coming,” Kevin said. “Okay, you’re right, Luca.”
I put a hand on his shoulder. “I don’t know. Maybe your parents are alive. Delgado might not be lying. But it doesn’t look good. We’ve waited long enough. We have to do something. We have to find Esme and make sure she is all right. Can you think of anywhere else Delgado and Jose might have taken her? Did he ever tell you where your parents were hiding?”
“No. He said it wasn’t safe for me to know. Just in case agents came to talk to me,” Kevin said.
“But do you have any idea? Any idea at all?” I asked.
Kevin stared at the water. “Yeah, maybe.”
“Where?” Alana asked.
“Another island. It’s over on the other side. Maybe twenty minutes by boat,” Kevin said.
“What’s so special about this particular island?” I asked.
“I was at Delgado’s once, and he had a map up on his computer screen. It was zeroed in on that island. That’s all I know.”
Alana looked at me. “It’s all we have to go on,” she said.
“So,” I said, “we call the Panamanian police and…”
“No,” Kevin said, “we can’t call the police. They’re all friends with Delgado. Haven’t you noticed them hanging out on the beach? They protect Delgado for some reason.”
“Okay, then we go out to the island,” I said. “Alana, do you still have the Jet Ski?”
Alana nodded. “I rented it for three days.”
“We’ll need a trailer on it,” I said.
“Yeah, there is a trailer for it,” she said.
I patted Kevin on the back. “Come on, bro. Let’s go find Esme. And clear all this up.”
Kevin nodded. I could tell he didn’t want to go. It was easier for him to believe his parents were on another island, sipping mango juice and soaking up the sun, than it was to discover Delgado was lying.
chapter eighteen
We waited until it was dark. It would be dangerous, but we didn’t want to tip off Delgado. Before we left, we checked Delgado’s house again. No one was around. We hooked the trailer to Alana’s Jet Ski and pushed it into the water. I loaded our boards onto the trailer and got on behind Alana. Kevin lay on top of the boards.
We moved along the shoreline until we had passed the reef. Alana cut straight out into deeper waters. The waves had calmed down, and we could hear people partying at the Purple Parrot.
Once we were out past the reef, the only sounds were of the Jet Ski pushing through the waves. Luckily, it was loud enough that talking was virtually impossible. I glanced back at Kevin a couple of times. It took about half an hour to reach the island. It was impossible to bring the Jet Ski in close to the rocky shoreline. If Delgado and Jose were here, they must have landed on a different beach.
Alana cut the engine, and we drifted across the surface. “I can’t get any closer,” she said. “You’ll have to paddle in.”
“Look,” Kevin said, pointing to the shore. “There’s a light.”
“Where?” I asked.
“To the right.”
I squinted at where he was pointing and thought I could make out a tiny glow in the jungle. “Okay,” I said. “Let’s go.”
Alana grabbed my arm and kissed me. “I’ll wait out here.”
“That would be great,” I said.
“For you, anything.” She gave me a crooked smile as I rolled off the Jet Ski and into the water.
Kevin already had the boards off the trailer. “Let’s try to go in on the side here,” he said, pointing. “Try to end up over there.” He pointed at a spot at the far edge of the beach. “We’ll have to dump our boards and keep low. They might be watching for us.”
“Kevin, you know everything Delgado told you might not be true?”
“I’m not ready to accept that,” Kevin said. “But I still think it’s best if no one sees us come ashore.”
“Who is Jose anyway? I mean, what’s his role in all of this?”
“I don’t know,” Kevin said. “He works with Delgado around the hotel. That’s all I know.” He looked over his shoulder at the approaching waves. “Paddle when the waves are high, okay? We should be able to make it over the reef that way.”
The first wave came in, and we paddled hard, staying on top as long as possible until it passed. In the lull between waves, we were stuck on the top of the reef. I kept my arms and legs out of the water, not wanting to get cut any more than I already was. I wasn’t all that concerned with what the reef would do to the bottom of Delgado’s board.
It took awhile, but eventually we made it in to the shore. I looked back out where we’d left Alana and couldn’t see her. It was a dark night. The bit of moonlight on the water illuminated fish scooting around the reef. I picked my board up and kept low. The sand had already cooled after the hot day. I carried my board toward the rocks Kevin had pointed out. He was kneeling behind one of the larger rocks, his surfboard on the ground beside him. I dropped my board next to his and crouched down.
“I think I saw something move over there,” Kevin said.
“When?” I whispered.
“Just as you walked up.”
We waited, staring into the darkness. As my eyes adjusted to the night landscape, I too thought I could see something at the edge of the jungle. Something, or someone, moving around.
“Right there?” I whispered.
Kevin tapped my arm. A sign to be quiet. I tried not to move. The cool air chilled my damp skin. The moon had broken through the clouds, although it was only a crescent.
“What should we do?” I said.
Kevin put his hand on my arm again. There was a flash of light in the jungle where I thought I had seen something move. And suddenly I recognized Jose’s profile as he lit a cigarette.
“We’re going to have to take him down,” Kevin said.
“But what if you’re right?” I said. “What if Delgado’s protecting your parents rather than holding them hostage?”
“Then I’ll have to apologize to him,” he said and ran across the beach.
chapter nineteen
Kevin moved silently. I followed him, but for the first time, I wasn’t able to catch up. He launched himself at Jose.
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“Kevin!” I said.
By the time I reached them, Kevin was sitting on Jose’s chest, holding his arms down. “Where are they?” he said.
Jose shook sand off his face. “What? What are you doing, man?” he said.
“You speak English!” I said.
“Of course I do, brah. I’m from LA.”
“Where are they?” Kevin said, shaking Jose.
“Get off, man.”
“Where are they?” Kevin said again.
“Who?” Jose looked at me. “Who is he looking for?”
“Esme and his parents,” I said.
Jose seemed unable to look directly at Kevin. “I don’t know about that, man.”
“What do you mean?” Kevin asked.
“I…man, I don’t know…”
“Is there a house or something here?” I asked.
“Yeah. Back there.”
Kevin grabbed Jose’s throat. “Who’s inside?”
“Delgado and that girl,” Jose squeaked.
Kevin squeezed Jose’s face in his hands. “That girl is my girlfriend. And you better not have laid a finger on her. Who else is in there?”
“No one,” Jose said.
“Are you sure?” I asked.
“It’s a two-room hut, brah. Kinda hard to hide.” Kevin raised his fist above his head. Jose winced and screwed his eyes shut. “Come on, man. You don’t want to hit me.”
“Kevin,” I said.
Kevin looked at me and then back at Jose. “You stay out here, or I swear I will pound you into the ground.”
“Whatever,” Jose said.
“Not whatever, Jose.” Kevin stood, and Jose rolled out from beneath him.
“Okay, okay, man. I’ll stay right here. I’m through with all of this anyway. It’s gotten too weird.” Jose picked his cigarette up off the sand and pulled his lighter out. Then he leaned back and started smoking as though nothing had happened.
“Come on,” Kevin said to me and took off through the jungle.
Crabs scattered as we ran through the thick growth. A lantern inside the house flickered.
“No electricity out here,” Kevin whispered. We crept to the side of the house. It was a solid wood structure with a window or two on each side. There was a porch with a lantern dangling from a hook and, inside, another three or four lanterns illuminated a living room. “Let’s check around the back.”