Envy the Night

by Michael Koryta

  He lifted her by her hair, and she would have screamed if the tape didn’t prevent it. Her eyes were streaming now, nose following suit, the pain demanding a physical response. He pushed her back against the side of the boat and leaned against her, pressing his body down on hers. The sudden change was almost too much for the boat; they rocked hard to one side, and he pulled back at the last possible second, the boat rolling with him. What if he hadn’t recovered? What if they’d just kept going over, ended up in the water, with tape over her mouth and her hands and feet bound? She’d die then, too. That or wait the ten minutes.

  “That tape stays,” he said, flicking his index finger off her mouth, smashing her lip back against her teeth. “Keep you from biting. Tape on the hands can stay, too. You won’t need those.”

  He moved suddenly, slammed her head back against the boat hard enough to make her vision blur, and then he got to his feet and moved back to the bow, leaned against it, and stared into the woods. She tilted her head, tried to see what he was looking at. The angle wasn’t right, though, and she couldn’t turn any farther without rolling her whole body over. Didn’t want to do that, and draw his attention back, so instead she kept craning her neck in that awkward position and tried to see where the boat had gone.

  She couldn’t see the boat, could hardly see the main shore. There was another island that she could see, but that wasn’t where AJ had taken Frank. She let her eyes pass over that shore and then started to look away, wanting to ease that awful pressure on her neck, when she saw motion.

  There was someone on the island. No, couldn’t be. She was seeing things, some weird reflection, the sun playing tricks even behind the dark clouds. Where had it gone? Wait, there it was again. Yes, someone was moving through the trees on the island just beside them.

  Nora kept herself in that awkward position, the pain momentarily irrelevant, and stared. Now the motion was gone, but she was positive she’d seen someone, and not where the boat had been beached. So had the boat been a trick, a ruse?

  King turned back from the bow then, and Nora moved her head, but it was a second too slow. He’d seen her staring out across the water, seen the intense look in her eyes, and he followed it.

  “Son of a bitch,” he said, lifting the gun, and Nora knew she’d just ruined someone’s chance to escape.

  Ezra crawled to the top of the rise and paused, looking out across the angry gray lake. There was the boat, a few hundred yards out, small but visible. Wait till he had it in the scope. Wouldn’t be small then, no, sir. Be nice and clear, a perfect picture of some poor bastard waiting to die.

  He couldn’t hear the shouting anymore, which could be good or bad. Maybe the idiot was out of shouting range now, and maybe he was quietly working his way back to the boat. Ezra didn’t know, and he wasn’t going to waste time worrying about it. Time was slipping away, and he needed to get out to his boat. They’d tied it up right in the middle of the stumps and partially submerged trees that surrounded this part of the shore. He could hear a rapping sound as the hull banged against a stump, and it made him like these bastards even a little less. Ezra took damn good care of that boat.

  Maybe twenty feet of fairly open ground to cover before he reached the lake and had to plunge into that mess of branches and water, fight his way out to the boat. It would take about thirty seconds to get on board, but he’d be in the open the whole time, and if whoever was out there with Nora had a rifle, Ezra might die before he ever got to take a shot. Nothing to do about that, though. Times came when you had to gamble, that was all. Ezra had gambled before, and still had the dice in his hand.

  He got his breathing steadied and thought about doing a countdown, ten seconds and then move, but decided the hell with it. A countdown didn’t make it any easier, and he didn’t have seconds to waste. He pushed off the ground with his hands and went upright for the first time since he’d left Vaughn, got his feet moving and ran down the hill.

  It was a slippery, dangerous mess in the rain, and twice he almost went down on his face, righted himself somehow and kept moving, hit the water knee deep and sloshed through it as quietly as he could, hunching now, trying to stay below the boat. The whole procedure seemed loud as hell to him, but out there on the lake with the wind whipping across the bay he doubted they’d hear. If they were watching close enough they would have seen him by now, which meant he needed to get the gun out fast.

  No shots came; no motor roared to life. He waded out to the stern, the water up almost to his armpits, and then braced his hands on the side of the boat and heaved. Damn, it was hard work. He was weighted down with water and wet clothes, and his upper body wasn’t what it used to be. He got over, though, flopped across the side and slid down to the floor, lay there breathing hard for a few seconds and waiting for a shot that didn’t come.

  Still silent. He pushed himself into a sitting position and cast one glance at the console, saw the empty ignition. They’d taken the key, as he’d feared. That could be dealt with later, though. Right now, he needed the rifle.

  He’d left it in the storage compartment under the floor, a space designed for fishing rods. He flipped the latch and lifted the cover and peered inside, felt a moment’s horror when he saw nothing but rods. But there it was, tucked all the way against the side, a gun that had never seemed as beautiful as it did now.

  It was a custom-built bolt-action rifle that Ezra had paid an absurd amount for six years earlier, and it was also the best long-range gun he’d ever held, one that would make the Browning A-Bolt and the Remington 700 look like pawnshop pickups. A high-velocity cartridge rested inside, waiting to head out of that perfect bore at twenty-eight hundred feet per second. Each round that left this gun was a gorgeous product of engineering.

  He pulled the rifle free and closed the storage compartment, then slipped the cover off the scope. It was a Yukon night-vision scope, a piece of equipment that cost more than Ezra had paid for some cars but that had seemed only an appropriate pairing for the rifle. He’d often chastised himself for both purchases, which felt like obscene wastes of money when he was in a rational mood. Today, it all felt incredibly cheap. He couldn’t believe they’d ferried it right across the lake to him so unwittingly. His own enemy had delivered him his sword. Mercy be on their souls now.

  Crawling back toward the outboard, he pressed himself in against the bench seat and lifted the gun barrel, rested it on the stern. Then he lowered his cheek to his shoulder, closed one eye, put the other to the scope.

  A night-vision scope, even a good one like this, didn’t demand total or near-total darkness for use. It had an infrared illuminator that could be engaged for such conditions, but today the standard image tube was all Ezra would need. It gathered the natural light and enhanced it, and in this storm that would work fine. He slid the rifle left a few inches to bring the boat into view, tweaked the scope to clarify the scene.

  The shouting man had not lied. There were two people in the boat, Nora Stafford and a big son of a bitch with a gun in his right hand. Nora had tape over her mouth, and the guy with the gun was—hold on a second, he had just lifted the gun.

  The shot rang out loud and clear even in the wind and rain, and for a second Ezra was absolutely baffled, because the guy was turned away from Ezra and firing across the lake. What the hell? Ezra thought, and then he got it: Renee. The tall man had spotted Renee and opened fire without bothering to see who the hell he was shooting at.

  “Shit,” he whispered and brought the crosshairs down quick, sighted along the big man’s chest, his finger tight on the trigger. It was a hell of a long shot, even with the scope, at least a hundred and sixty yards. Tougher still because the guy was standing sideways from Ezra’s position, offering only his profile. All these details ran through Ezra’s mind fast and then were pushed aside because the son of a bitch had fired again and Ezra couldn’t let him continue. He clenched his teeth together, steadied his breathing, and pulled the trigger.

  It was maybe the best shot he’d e
ver made. Certainly the best he’d made so quickly. The bullet hit the guy in the neck, blew a cloud of blood into the air, and then he was falling forward, collapsing against the side of the boat. Shit, he’d fallen right on Nora. As Ezra watched through the scope, the boat tipped dangerously to the left. For a moment he thought the body would slide into the water and the boat would right itself, but somehow the guy hung up on the side. The boat rocked back to the right, but then Nora struggled beneath the body and her motion made it roll to the left again. There was a half-second pause where equilibrium was still possible, but she kept thrashing and the little boat overbalanced and tipped, spilling them both into the water.

  “Damn!” Ezra lowered the gun and peered out, as if that would somehow help him see, then lifted it again and looked back through the scope. He hadn’t meant to send them both into the water like that, but it wasn’t the worst thing that could have happened. He’d seen the bullet’s impact, knew that it had missed Nora, hitting at least three feet above her. She could swim, surely, or at least hang on to the upside-down boat until Ezra could get out there.

  He kept the scope to his eye and watched the water and saw nothing. Nobody moving, nobody splashing. What the hell was she doing? Surely she hadn’t been knocked out in the fall.

  Then he remembered the tape.

  35

  __________

  Nora didn’t know what had happened. One second King was standing above her and firing at the figure on the island, and the next drops of blood showered across the boat and he collapsed on top of her. Her first thought was that lightning had hit him; her second was that the person on the island had returned fire. Then she felt the boat begin to tip, and the source of King’s demise was no longer a concern.

  They rolled backward until her hair was almost in the water, and she thrashed against him, trying to push forward, send them the other way. He was too heavy, though, and the tape kept her from using her arms or legs to push him off. She rocked back and threw herself forward again, a desperate heave, and still he was on top of her, his blood dripping through her hair and down her cheek. The wind gusted again, shook the boat just enough to worsen the lopsided weight, and they slid back toward the water. She had a fraction of a second to suck air in through her nose and brace for the cold, and then they were over the side and she was sinking.

  She fell fast and soundlessly, dropped through the frigid water with a sense of terror and helplessness she’d never felt and couldn’t have imagined before, strong and healthy and uninjured and dying all the same.

  Bunched up the way she was, unable to kick with her feet or pull with her arms, she sank quickly, dropped all the way to the bottom. Her eyes were open, and she could see the shimmer of light that was the surface, knew that she would die staring up at it.

  Then she bounced. She’d landed on her ass, but a final violent twist got her feet under her, and she realized that the tape had taken every important motion away from her except one: She could bend her knees.

  She pressed her feet into the lake bottom and bent at the knees and pushed off as hard as she could, shot upward again. The lake wasn’t deep here, maybe ten feet, and that one massive push was enough get her to the surface. Enough for one gasping inhalation through her nose. Then she sank again.

  This time she was equally sure she’d die on the bottom. The little bit of air she’d gotten didn’t feel like nearly enough, but she also didn’t need to wait for the bounce this time, knew what she had to do, and so she landed with her feet out, almost upright. One more bend and push, one more rise, but she knew it was futile even as she headed toward the surface. She wasn’t getting enough air with these brief appearances above the water, and the adrenaline-fueled strength was fading fast. She could manage another rise or two, maybe, but eventually she wouldn’t come up fast enough and she’d frantically try for a breath and take in water instead, drown, and sink back to the bottom, this time for good.

  She hit the surface, got a little more air this time, then sank again without ever seeing anything but angry dark clouds. Her feet hit the bottom and she went through that hopeless routine one more time, probably the last repetition she could manage, bend and push. This time she came up under the boat.

  Her first reaction to breaking the surface beneath the upside-down boat was panic, but it saved her life. Instead of simply sinking again, she instinctively jerked her head backward, as if to clear herself out from under the boat. She didn’t clear it, of course, but instead drilled the back of her skull against the aluminum frame, wedged between one of the seat brackets and the side of the boat.

  She stuck. Only temporarily, for a few seconds, but it was enough to hold her head out of the water so she could get a breath and realize what had happened. Then she felt herself sliding away from the bracket, ready to sink again, and responded by arching her back. The motion forced her head back against the bracket and lifted her legs, and her body slid into an awkward floating position, as close to a survival float as you could possibly achieve with no arms to balance you. It wouldn’t have been possible without the bracket there under her head, but it worked now.

  Breathe. That was all she had to do, all she needed to worry about for this moment, just sucking air in through her nose, trying to get as much oxygen into her lungs as possible before she slipped out of this position and sank again. She hauled the air in, her chest rising and falling, got in at least five breaths before she began to slide away from the bracket again.

  She tried to repeat the motion that had worked before, arching her back and lifting her legs, but this time she couldn’t find the bracket, and her head kept sliding away.

  No, no, no. Come back, I can stay alive here, I can stay alive . . .

  The water was over her face and she was sinking again when she realized that it hadn’t been her head sliding away from the bracket, but the other way around. The boat was moving, pushed aside. She watched it move as she dropped, was three feet deep and still going when legs bumped against her back and then an arm encircled her, wrapped around her neck and hooked under her chin and lifted.

  A second later she broke the surface, blinked water out of her eyes, and stared at Renee, unable to utter a single word of thanks because of that damn tape.

  Ezra dropped the rifle and got to his feet, hardly conscious of the assailant who still lingered in the woods behind him, and looked around his boat for some way to help.

  The key was gone, and he didn’t have time to hotwire the ignition. That left no power source but the electric trolling motor, and though it would surely be too slow it was the only chance he had. Ezra couldn’t make a swim like that, not anymore.

  A swim. The thought triggered a memory of Renee and the initial source of the shooting. She was so much closer to the overturned boat, and she could swim. Had she seen what happened? Did she know Nora was in the water?

  He turned back to search the lake for her, but then something moved onshore behind him, and he whirled back to face it, reaching for the rifle.

  “Shit,” he said and picked up the rifle but left it pointed down. The movement on shore was from Vaughn, who had just stepped out of the trees, holding his gun ahead of him with a wavering grip.

  “Come on!” Ezra yelled, turning to the trolling motor, a hopeless effort but the best he could now make for Nora. “Get out here.”

  Get Vaughn and go after Nora. That’s what Ezra was thinking as he stepped up into the bow, the gun held loosely at his side, his eyes scanning the woods to see if anyone else was approaching. No, just Vaughn, and why wouldn’t he hurry, and lower that damn gun before somebody got—

  Vaughn fired from the shoreline, and for a second Ezra was so stunned he didn’t react, but then he realized it hadn’t been an accident and he got both hands around the rifle and lifted it as Vaughn took a second shot, missing again, and a third.

  The third round caught Ezra in his right side, blew through his ribs and out of his back and splattered blood and flesh off the windshield that guarded th
e steering console. He tried to keep lifting the rifle, to get it aimed at Vaughn, but the bullet had spun him and now he was stumbling. His knees banged off the side of the boat and he couldn’t right himself, flipped over the side and fell into the tangled branches of a partially submerged tree. The branches snapped under him, and he dropped into the water as Vaughn fired again, missing again. Ezra tried to lift the rifle, but it was too heavy now. Or was it even in his hand?

  Another branch snapped, and he dropped again, and then the gray sky was fading into an odd red mist and Ezra couldn’t focus anymore, couldn’t see to fire even if he’d had the gun ready to shoot. The red mist spun into black and then shattered into jagged points of light, and Ezra Ballard closed his eyes and welcomed the water.

  Renee got the tape off Nora’s hands first, which allowed her to hang on to the boat while Renee freed her feet. The feeling of power, of life, that came back to Nora as she moved her legs and arms was intense. She could support herself again, move again, was no longer helpless. She tore the tape off her mouth, smacked her lips together and sucked in a grateful breath of air and rain, tasted the fresh water on her stale tongue.

  “Thank you,” she said. “Thank you.”

  The rain was hammering the overturned boat, a sound like a drum corps, but even so they both stopped talking and listened as another sound, a series of cracks, echoed over the water.

  “Guns,” Renee said. “Somebody’s shooting.”

  Nora didn’t say anything. The strength was already fading from her newly freed legs, and even the gentle kick needed to stay upright seemed difficult.

  “Can we roll it over?” she said.

  “The boat?” Renee shifted in the water, looked at the capsized boat as if surprised that Nora would want to be inside it. She was treading water easily, her breathing steady. Beneath the surface, her arms and feet moved in ghostly circles, her hair fanning out around her shoulders.