Broken Stern: An Ellie O'Conner Novel (Pine Island Coast Florida Suspense Series) Book 1

by Jack Hardin

  Victor’s faced bloomed red, and he spit toward Ellie. The thick glob missed her face by an inch and hit the glass. It stuck and didn’t move. She smiled. “You have to agree that I have a point. Give me something. Anything. Anything that I can use that will get me up one more step. I’m not looking for you to get me up the whole staircase.”

  Victor got the metaphor. He remained silent for a long two minutes, staring at the seatback in front of him. A rookie might assume the conversation was over. Ellie knew it was not.

  “There’s a place between Pine Island and Cayo Costa. Mondongo. You familiar with it?”

  “Of course.” Mondongo Key Island was a few acres in size and privately owned.

  “It’s not the island. It’s out on Mondongo Rocks - one of the little islands. There’s an old commercial fishing boat.” Victor stopped and sighed. He was unused to betraying his cause, and it was clearly not something he was enjoying. Ellie waited patiently for him to continue. She was familiar with the boat. “It’s beached up on a sandbar. Been there forever from what I know about it. The crews make their stash there every few weeks.”

  “Stash of what?” she asked. “Drugs?”

  “No. We didn’t get this far by being stupid. We don’t leave kilos hidden out in the open like that. Gasoline. They hide gasoline in there. For the boats.”

  “For the return trip,” she said.

  “Yes. They offload, go grab the fuel, and head back.”

  Victor’s admission confirmed Ellie’s fears. Massive amounts of drugs were being swapped in her backyard, right under their noses. “Where do they unload the product?” she pressed.

  He smiled and shook his head. “No. Nice try.” He shrugged. “Anyway, I’ve been in the Greybar Hotel two years now. They change routes all the time. Who knows where they channel in now? They don’t tell me. I don’t need to know.”

  “So how can you be sure the boat is still in use for such a purpose? That boat gets visited by tourists and passersby every now and then. It’s hard to believe no one has ever noticed gallons of gas in its guts.”

  “I just do, okay? It’s only there for a few hours - half a day at most. All happens at night.”

  “All right, fine,” Ellie consented. “Let’s say that’s all correct. How do I know you won’t be on the phone within the hour telling your boys the DEA has been snooping around and you tell them what you just told me? No one will drop gas within thirty miles of that boat.”

  Victor bent his chin down and rubbed it on his left shoulder, relieving an itch. “In a normal case you would be right,” he said. “But I have a - how do you say - a beef? I have a beef with one of the usual runners.”

  “What beef?”

  His grin was crooked. “Once again, no.”

  She smiled. “Okay.” If Victor was telling the truth about the boat, then she had a solid lead on something tangible. If he was lying, she would go back with nothing. Ellie didn’t do all this just to go back with nothing. “Victor, if you’re lying to me, I’ll have you back in your old cell with Boosie bending you over like a palm frond before you can say, ‘Blessed Mary, help me.’ We clear?”

  Victor swallowed hard. “Clear as my mother’s eyes.”

  “One more question,” she said. “You ever heard the name Pete Wellington?”

  He frowned, thinking, shook his head. “No. Never heard of him. Who is he?”

  “Doesn’t matter. Nevermind.”

  The ride was quiet for the next two miles until Victor spoke up again. “You’re moving me today, right?” His urgency was apparent.

  “No. I’m not.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Think about it. You go offsite for a day, walk right back into a new cell block...people will figure it out. Once I do we’ll have a chat with Warden Nickels and have him structure a good reason for moving you so it doesn’t look like you pulled any strings.”

  Victor nodded. He didn’t seem happy about having to wait it out. “Okay. Okay. But don’t leave me hanging.” He leaned in and stared at the brass nameplate that sat above the chest pocket of her uniform. “Jones,” he said. “You screw me, and I’ll have my people find you.”

  She smiled. “You think Jones is my real name, Victor? Come on. You’re smarter than that.”

  “A hot blonde DEA agent. Wouldn’t be hard to track down. We’ll find you.”

  “Appreciate the compliment.”

  In the driver’s seat, Ben put a couple fingers up to his ear, listening to what was coming through his mic. He adjusted the rearview mirror and said to Ellie, “We’ve got company.”

  Ellie turned and looked out the rear window. The Tahoe was following behind them the standard twenty-yard distance. Behind it, Ellie could see a portion of a yellow Dodge Charger hovering just off the Tahoe’s tail lights. A black Expedition followed behind it. Ellie sighed and turned back toward Victor. “These your people?”

  He shrugged. “How would I know?”

  “Do you have anyone who wants to hurt you?”

  “Sure, but not bad enough to do this, I don’t think.”

  Ellie spoke through the cage. “Ben, what’s the play?”

  “We continue on. We have a no slow, no stop policy. The Sheriff's vehicle behind us has already radioed it in. Backup should be here in fifteen minutes.”

  “We won’t have five minutes.”

  “The Tahoe will try and keep them off of us.” Ben punched the accelerator, and the Crown Vic quickly added another fifteen miles an hour to its speed.

  Ellie swiveled so she could keep an eye on what was transpiring behind them. Victor tried to follow suit but was constrained by his chains. The Charger was moving back and forth behind the Tahoe, trying to gauge the right time to move ahead of it.

  “Ben, I know transport officers typically don’t ride in the back. If we do end up coming to a stop for any reason, I’m going to need you to make it a priority to get out and open my door.” The rear doors could not be opened from the inside.

  “I will,” he said, flicking his eyes back to the rear view.

  Tires squealed behind them, and Ellie watched as the Charger lurched forward into the other lane, empty of oncoming traffic, and pulled up next to the Tahoe. A darkened window came down, and a meaty hand clutching a handgun came out, pointed at the Sheriff's vehicle. It discharged; they heard the chatter. The front tire of the Tahoe took the impact of the second round and slapped around on the pavement.

  Three more clacks. The rear tire exploded, and their escort swiveled hard to its left and ran off into a field before coming to a stop inches from a barbed wire fence.

  “Oh, crap,” Ben said.

  “Ben, we’re going to have to stop,” Ellie said.

  “I’m not going to—”

  “Ben, I don’t know what they taught you in training, but I’ll tell you this.” She raised her voice. “If you stay at this speed and play cat and mouse with them, it’s not going to end well for any of us.” She stared into his eyes through the rearview mirror. He was young. Probably no more than twenty-five. “Ben,” she said, “this isn’t the movies. You get us flipped at this speed, and it’s lights out for all of us. You married?”

  “No.”

  “Do you want to be?”

  “I...well, I’m engaged.” His knuckles were white as they gripped the wheel with everything he had. The Charger pulled up behind them, the Expedition following.

  “If you don’t do exactly as I say, your fiancée will have to find someone else to marry. Do you understand?”

  At that moment a burst of semi-automatic fire erupted from the Charger. Bullets pierced the trunk lid behind Ellie and Victor and sounded like soda cans being popped open. Ben screamed, “What do I do?”

  “If we stop I can have more control. They’re going to shoot our tires out too. I’d rather not be approached by Victor’s friends hanging upside down by my seatbelt and no way to get out.”

  “How do I do it?”

  Ellie scanned the road ahead, looki
ng for any structures lining the road. “Hold on,” she said. Without taking her eyes off the road, she spoke to Victor. “You’ve got some super nice friends, Victor.”

  “Hey, this wasn’t my idea! I didn’t know anything about it.”

  “Keep them behind us,” Ellie told Ben. “Don’t let them up on our side.” The Charger slid to the right, and Ben moved the cruiser in front of it. It moved left. He moved left. Ellie looked at Victor. “Who am I dealing with back there?”

  “How am I supposed to know?”

  “Victor, take a wild guess.” She quickly glanced at him. She wasn’t convinced that he was properly motivated to help her, so she said, “If I don’t know who I’m dealing with, then I will only make more mistakes. You end up in my crossfire, and you’ll only make it out on a medical examiner's gurney. I need to know who might be in those vehicles.”

  The Charger slammed into their rear bumper, and all three passengers lurched forward in their seats.

  Victor shook his head. “I don’t know. Maybe José and Juan—”

  “I don’t need names, I need skills. Weapons.”

  “Uhh, no big skills, I guess. Couple shotguns probably. Other than the SMGs they just opened up. Can’t be sure.”

  Ellie spotted a large red barn ahead on their left, sitting in the corner of a vacant field. “Up there, Ben. That’s as good as it’s going to get. Turn off behind that. Do it quickly so they don’t anticipate it.”

  “All right.”

  “I need your shotgun as soon as we get out.” Ellie unbuckled. Two vehicles, one of them an SUV. Ellie figured that there would be as few as four men coming to get Victor, as many as eight. Probably no more than eight. “Ben, are you any good with your sidearm?”

  “Yes.” His voice trembled.

  “We’ll get out of this,” she reassured him. “Just follow my lead. Stay calm. Remember your training.”

  Ben reached over and unhinged the security latch on the shotgun rack and returned both hands to the wheel. “Hang on,” he said. He slowed just as the cruiser’s tires turned hard off the asphalt. The rear tires spun out as they struggled for purchase on the dry, loose dirt. The tires hitched in, and the axles jiggled hard as he drove off into the grass, brought the vehicle around the old barn, and slammed on the brakes. He threw the transmission into park and opened his door, got out, and opened Ellie’s. She jolted out, and he slammed it shut and locked it. They could hear Victor yelling something unintelligible from within. He handed her the shotgun. It was a 12 gauge Benelli M4, a rough and ready battle weapon, a Marine-issue standard. It was a gas-operated, low-recoil weapon, its two pistons located just in front of the chamber, driving the action.

  The Charger wasn’t prepared to stop so suddenly. It overshot the dirt road and spun on the blacktop, finally coming to rest facing away from the barn. The driver shoved down the accelerator, and a black cloud of smoke plumed up, and the car shot forward. The Expedition, being further back, had more time to accommodate the turn and came in only thirty yards behind them, barreling in fast.

  Ellie ran into the barn through its open double-wide doors. Ben followed close behind, his sidearm drawn, his eyes wide with fear. The inside smelled of a combination of new lumber, old dirt, and fusty hay. A pile of fresh two-by-fours sat off to the left along with a couple hammers and a box of nails tipped over, half its contents strewn across the surface. Other than some old hay in the back, the barn was empty and looked like it hadn’t been put to use in a long time. The naked field beyond sat fallow. At the rear of the barn was a high open loft with a wide exterior opening that looked out onto the road. Ellie could see old bales of hay up there, strewn about like discarded building blocks. A ramp led up the right side, a pattern of old wood and bright pine where recent repairs had been made. There were no other doors or windows, no other means of access beyond the wide mouth they had just entered through.

  Cars doors being slammed could be heard from behind the back of the barn. Ellie pointed to the stack of lumber. It was about four feet high. “Get behind this and watch my six. Cover the door. I’m going up. If they’re smart they're going to move in from both sides. Be ready.”

  “Okay.” Ben maneuvered behind the lumber and squatted down.

  Ellie moved swiftly and cautiously up the ramp, a firm grip on the shotgun. There would be seven rounds in the pipe; another seven were in the shell carrier on the side of the gun. She had fourteen shots. After that, if she needed to, she would have to turn to her Glock. She didn’t anticipate the need to use her handgun.

  Just before her feet hit the top landing, she heard voices barking orders in Spanish. She put one knee down and peeked out the wide opening that looked over the vehicles and the road beyond. Three men were jogging away from the Charger and moving quickly toward three others who had presumably exited the Expedition. They grouped up and spoke in hushed tones as they quickly made a plan. They were all armed, one clutching a shotgun, four holding handguns, and another gripping a submachine gun; Ellie couldn’t tell which make. She moved behind the wall, looked back toward the inside of the barn, and clicked her tongue on the roof of her mouth twice. Ben turned and looked. She held up five fingers, made a fist, held up one more. Ben nodded nervously. Ellie didn’t know anything about Ben and had to assume that he was not qualified to get them out of this. Instead, she felt the added burden of keeping him safe, helping him get out of this alive, making sure he kept his wedding date. By the terrified look he was trying to suppress, he would probably be more of a liability over the next few minutes than an asset. For now though, she needed that doorway behind her covered.

  The men started to break up and spread out, three toward one side of the barn and three toward the other. Ellie would have to make the first move. And she already had her target selected. It was the man with the submachine gun. She had to take that gun out of the equation. She peered through a crack in one of the exterior boards, found him, and noted his pace of movement. He was bringing up the rear on the group in front of her and was only feet from disappearing around the corner. So like a snake who sinks his teeth in and quickly pulls back, Ellie shouldered the shotgun, brought the barrel out through the opening, and put the man into the ghost-ring sights. She pressed the trigger. The gun bucked against her, and a one-ounce slug tore into the man’s leg. He dropped like a sack of flour, forgot his weapon, and lay on the ground screaming, holding his leg. Ellie couldn’t see his friends; they were already down the side of the barn. He lay there in agony, stunned by the pain and the sheer trauma. The submachine gun was now laying six feet from him and no longer presented a threat.

  One down.

  Five to go.

  Suddenly, gunfire erupted from outside the barn, piercing the old wood and the corrugated tin roof above. They didn’t know the layout of the inside and were firing randomly into the top area, hoping to hit whoever had shot their friend. Ellie ran to the far side of the loft and ducked in behind the woeful coverage of a couple bales of hay.

  The firing ceased, and Ellie turned and clicked her tongue again. Ben turned, looked. She extended three fingers and swept them toward her right and then swept two toward her left. He nodded, turned back to the door, his weapon ready.

  She couldn’t go back down the ramp. That was the wall they had fired into. They might do it again. As she had come into the loft, Ellie had noted her exit point. The loft provided a higher perspective that gave her the upper hand. But things could quickly change, as they just had, and being able to relocate, to stay mobile, was essential.

  Unfortunately, from here, there was only one way down. Ellie quickly slung the shotgun, moved to the edge of the loft, and slithered feet first over the side. As her body swung into the open air, she gripped the edge of the loft floor. She looked down. The floor was clear beneath her. From the soles of her feet to the dirt, there was still another ten feet. She let go.

  Her feet touched the bottom, and in one fluid motion Ellie swept her arm back, clearing the butt of the shotgun away from th
e floor, and allowed herself to land into a crouch and disseminating much of the impact of the fall. She landed cleanly and darted over to Ben. She motioned for him to cover the left side of the wide doorway. Ellie would cover the right. She watched, waiting for what she knew was inevitable.

  And there it was. The light streaming through a tiny slit in the boards turned dark, covered by shadow. All the men would be huddled together. There was no reason for them to spread out. She put a knee in the dirt and brought the gun up, sending off three slugs in succession, placing each one eighteen inches from the other. A painful yell and grunt came from the other side. The shadow disappeared.

  Ellie heard Ben’s handgun discharge from behind her. She looked and saw a fat man fall into the left side of the doorway, holding his stomach, his shotgun now laying at his feet. Then, at the same moment, a black shotgun barrel appeared from around the opening, and Ellie called for Ben to duck. The shotgun erupted in a volley of fire, buckshot chewing into the lumber, sending a couple top boards flying onto Ellie and Ben. Seven shots later the man had an empty gun. Ellie peeked out and saw the man stepping into the barn, and, as he dropped his empty shotgun and reached around his back for a handgun, Ben rose up, fired twice, and missed. The man jerked back in fear, stopped reaching for his weapon. “Freeze!” Ellie yelled. He stopped and put his hands up. “Cover him, Ben!” Ben swung around and trained his weapon on him, still staying low.

  Ellie saw the man’s eyes lock onto something on the outside, and a shadow retracted from the dirt and disappeared. They were fleeing. She came out from behind the lumber and peered out. To her left it was empty. Just to her right, where she had fired the three slugs, two men lay on the ground in pools of blood, one of them shot in the thigh, another above his waistline. They were both breathing but incapacitated. Ellie scrambled over and kicked their weapons out of reach.

  “On the ground!” she heard Ben yelling from inside.