Natural Selection

by Liz Wolfe

  They were safe.

  Delighted yelps and whistles issued from the back. Paige looked at Connor and saw a huge lump had formed above his right temple. He slumped a little in his seat.

  “Are you all right?”

  “I’m okay. Just banged my head.” Connor winced and shifted in his seat.

  Paige looked down and saw a dark stain on his shirt. “Connor, you were shot!”

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-SIX

  “SON OF A BITCH!” Dennis yelled.

  “No! They’re getting away. Wade, do something!” Nathan pointed a demanding finger at Wade.

  Wade thought what he’d like to do was reach out and break Nathan’s skinny, trembling finger. Or maybe his scrawny neck.

  “Shut up, Nathan.” Wade stared at the plane as it flew away, carrying five people who could put him away for the rest of his life. No way in hell was he going to let that happen.

  “Now what?” Dennis demanded, turning to Wade.

  “Well, I’d say that we need to get the hell off this island, unless you want to wait for the cops to show up.”

  “Police?” Martin frowned. “I suppose that will be the first thing they’ll do. Run to the police and tell them what happened.”

  “How long do we have?” Dennis asked.

  “Depends on where they’re headed. They could reach one of the other islands in less than an hour. But I’m thinking they’ll head back to Florida. It’ll take them three hours or more to get there, then I’d guess at least another two or three talking to the cops. Depending on how seriously the police take their story, and whether they have to call the locals, could be anywhere from a few hours to a couple of weeks,” Wade said.

  “Why don’t we turn our attention to making sure we aren’t leaving them any clues as to who we are?” Dennis asked.

  Wade jumped into the jeep and drove them to the house. He gathered up the few things he’d brought with him and helped the men carry their belongings out to the jeep. They drove down to the boat and Wade unloaded everything.

  “Get this stuff stowed. I’m going back for the bodies.”

  “Why do we have to take them with us?” Nathan asked. “Just leave them here.”

  “Because, we don’t want anything lying around that points to us having ever been here. That’s why I had Frank fly you all down to Florida from the New York office, so there wouldn’t be a record of you having gone anywhere.” Wade wasn’t sure he could even make it back to Florida without tossing Nathan overboard.

  “That’s right. That’s why we told everyone we were spending a couple of weeks at the shore house.” Martin hoisted a bag and set off for the boat.

  “We’ll take the bodies and dump them when we get out to sea. Kevin, you’re with me.”

  Wade and Kevin climbed back into the Jeep and drove to the house. After loading the bodies in the jeep, Wade checked the house one last time to make sure there was nothing that could place them there. His plans had fallen apart, and it was all that damn girl’s fault. He and Kevin wiped down every surface he could think of that the men might have touched, then drove back to the lagoon.

  “Problem?” Wade walked over to Martin and Dennis, standing at the wheel.

  “Damn thing won’t start.” Martin turned the key again.

  “That’s because I removed the distributor cap so they couldn’t take the boat,” Wade reminded him. “Just take a minute to replace it.”

  He pulled the distributor cap out of a bag and pulled open the door to the engine compartment. In a few minutes he had everything attached and signaled Martin to try the ignition again. The engine turned over, coughed, and sputtered.

  “Damn!” Wade slammed his fist against the floor. “They’ve cut the fuel line.”

  “We’re stuck here?” Nathan wailed. “We’re stuck on this damn island while they just flew away?” Nathan pointed a finger at Wade. “I hold you entirely responsible for this … this debacle.”

  “Nathan, you point that skinny finger at me again, and I swear I’ll cut it off and shove it down your throat.”

  “I assume you’ve got someone lined up to save our asses.” Martin pulled his satellite phone from his vest pocket and tossed it to Wade.

  “Of course. That’s what you pay me for, isn’t it?” Wade took the phone and punched in numbers.

  “That and a lot more. Just get us out of here.”

  “Frank. Wade here. I need a favor.” Wade listened for a minute. “Me and some buddies are here on a Caribbean island, and we need to get picked up. Right now.”

  The three men watched Wade while he listened to Frank give him several reasons he couldn’t drop everything and fly to his rescue.

  “Listen, Frank, I’ll make it worth your time and trouble. Say ten grand.” That was more like it. Wade listened as Frank hemmed and hawed, coming up with a few more reasons why it was such an inconvenience. “Tell you what, Frank. You land your sorry butt here in four hours, and there’s a two grand bonus in it for you.” Wade gave Frank the coordinates. “And I’ll need some fuel line and tools.”

  “Frank will bring what I need to fix the engine. You three will take the boat back to Florida and return it to the rental company,” Wade said. “It’s in my name so there won’t be any connection to you.”

  “What about you and Kevin?” Martin asked.

  “We’ll fly back with Frank. And we’ll take all the weapons so you don’t have to hassle getting them off the boat unseen.”

  “I can’t believe we’re paying your friend twelve grand just to get off this island,” Nathan whined. “That seems a bit extravagant.”

  “More like twelve grand to save us from a lifetime incarceration,” Dennis reminded him. Nathan paled.

  “That’s something else we have to deal with now,” Nathan complained.

  “What?” Martin asked.

  “The pilot has seen all of us. That girl, too. What if one of them recognizes us from a picture in the paper or something?”

  “That’s a consideration,” Martin admitted.

  “I knew we should have taken care of this some other way.” Nathan turned to Dennis and Martin. “But you two just had to have a little fun, didn’t you? You two couldn’t foresee anything like this happening, and you wouldn’t listen to me. Well, now everything’s about to blow up in our faces.”

  Wade decided that if he ever had an opportunity, he was going to cut Nathan’s throat. That would stop the whining bastard from complaining about everything under the sun.

  “I’ll handle it when we get back to Portland. I know where they both live. It won’t be hard to get rid of them.”

  “What about the others?” Nathan asked.

  “The others haven’t seen you. They don’t know your names. They aren’t a problem.”

  “Well, not immediately,” Martin said. “But we still have the issue of what they’ve all seen and learned whether they know it or not.”

  “Then I’ll get rid of them for you, too.” Wade grinned at Martin. “It’ll cost you, though.”

  “Hell, son, everything worth having costs something.” Martin laughed. “Get rid of the girl and the pilot first. The others can wait.”

  “Well, not for long.” Nathan objected. “We know Alex saw some of our shipments leaving Colombia, and he probably knows that we’re bringing in more than parts. And that other girl saw those emails from our suppliers. She’s not too stupid to put two and two together soon enough.”

  “Yes, Nathan, we’re well aware of the problem. Like Martin said, Wade will take care of it.” Dennis turned and headed back to the house.

  “And the blond fellow.” Nathan followed Dennis. “He keeps asking about what his wife was investigating when she was killed. What if they all started talking and worked out the connection?”

  “Nathan, don’t fret yourself so much.” Martin laid a hand on his shoulder. “We’ll take the yacht back to Florida, Frank will fly us to New York, and then we’ll go back to Portland. Wade’s going to take
care of all this, and, soon, it’ll be behind us.”

  Martin laughed. “And we’ll be gone before anyone will think to question us. The deal for the device goes down on Friday, the funds all get transferred, and by Saturday night we’re drinking champagne on a tropical island.”

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  “WE HAVE A LITTLE PROBLEM,” Connor said quietly.

  “You mean besides the bullet hole in your side?” Paige asked.

  “I’m all right. The bullet zipped right through the flesh. It’s just bleeding a little.”

  “Then what?”

  “I think those bastards managed to hit the fuel tank. We should still have almost half a tank left.”

  Her eyes flew across the array of gauges and lights in the cockpit. The fuel gauge was just above empty. “How far can we get?”

  “Not far enough, I’m afraid. The good news is that we can land in the ocean without a problem. The bad news is that we’re stuck there until someone comes along to rescue us.”

  “What about the radio? We can radio for help.”

  “They removed the handset from the radio.” Connor pointed to where the handset should have been. “My guess is they’ve disabled the GPS, too.”

  “What do we do?”

  “When we run out of fuel, which will be soon, I’ll land in the ocean and we’ll wait for someone to come by and rescue us. The plane will be fine on the ocean as long as we don’t encounter any rough seas, and that’s not likely in the gulf unless there’s a storm.”

  “How far are we from Florida?” she asked.

  “About eighty miles from the gulf coast. The good news is that we’re well past Cuba.”

  Paige shuddered. She hadn’t even thought of that. She stepped into the rear of the plane and explained the situation to the group.

  Just a few minutes after she returned to her seat the plane’s engine coughed as it used up the last drops of fuel. The group had taken the news of their impending sea landing fairly well. Probably because being off Hell Island and away from the Hunters made them feel they could survive anything. That, and the fact that Paige hadn’t told them about the damaged GPS. Connor glided the plane down to the sea, doing exceptionally well for a man with a bullet hole in his side.

  “Hang on, this is going to be a little rough,” Connor said. Paige wasn’t about to complain, no matter how rough it was. She had already come to the conclusion that if Connor couldn’t fly the plane, she was going to have to do it. Any landing he made had to be better than what she would do.

  When the pontoons hit the water, Paige heard thumps and a couple of muffled groans from the back. She got tossed around a bit and Connor was hanging onto the throttle, leaning to one side. As the plane slowed, he slumped over the wheel, and she saw that he’d bled more than he’d admitted.

  “Connor!” She put her hand on his side, and he groaned in pain. Her fingers were sticky with his blood. “Ty, clear a place for Connor to lie down back there.”

  Paige pulled up his shirt. The bullet had been slowed by plowing through all the stuff in the bag before it went into his side. But Connor was wrong about it having passed through. There was no exit wound. The bullet was still lodged in his flesh.

  Ty came up to help her get Connor to the rear of the plane and laid him down.

  Paige pulled a shirt from her backpack and pressed it against his side, ignoring Connor’s groan at the pressure.

  “Give me your belt,” she instructed Alex. “Then lift him. Gently.”

  Alex removed the belt and handed it to her, then placed his hands under Connor’s shoulders and lifted. Paige slipped the belt under his back and buckled it so that it held the bandage in place. Connor closed his eyes, and his mouth thinned into a tight line, but he didn’t make a sound. Alex lowered him back to the floor.

  “Just try to rest. The less you move, the less you’ll bleed.” Paige brushed the hair off his forehead and blinked back the tears stinging her eyes.

  The sun was still well above the horizon, and she hoped a ship would come by or a plane would fly over and see them before dark. They had no food, no water. And she was praying they weren’t drifting toward Cuba.

  Connor had fallen asleep. Or passed out from the pain and loss of blood. Paige shoved herself into the seat closest to him and leaned her head back. At least the Hunters couldn’t use their boat to find them. She dozed off comforting herself with the thought that the Hunters were stuck on their private island until the police came for them.

  Paige jerked awake some time later. Checking her watch, she saw that she had been asleep for two hours. Everyone else had fallen asleep, too. Great. She hadn’t even set a watch or told everyone what to do if a plane or ship happened to come by. She leaned over and looked at Connor’s bandage, relieved to find that the bleeding had slowed considerably.

  “Hey, everyone, wake up. We need to talk.” Paige clapped her hands

  “What?” Aleisha lifted her head from Alex’s shoulder.

  “What’s up, boss?” Ty asked, rubbing his eyes.

  “Yo, I’m awake,” Nick called.

  “We need to go over some procedures,” Paige said. “If a ship goes by, we need to flag it down. If they aren’t looking in our direction, they might not see us. Same for a plane. Lots of people fly to Mexico, and some of the islands in small planes and they could spot us too.”

  “We need flares,” Ty said.

  “Flares would be good,” Paige agreed. “Nick, check around back there and see if you can find any kind of emergency equipment.”

  “Not much back here. Wait, there’s a couple of metal boxes.”

  “Now, I know we’re all exhausted. But we need to set up a watch schedule. We don’t want to be asleep if a boat passes by.”

  “Hey, I found some flares. Not many, though,” Nick said.

  “How many?” Paige asked.

  “Three. No, wait, four,” Nick answered.

  “That’s enough. All we have to do is get someone’s attention.”

  “What if they don’t stop?” Ty asked.

  “There’s an unspoken maritime rule,” Paige told them. “If someone’s in trouble, anyone who can goes to help.”

  “Who has first watch?” Ty asked.

  “I’ll take first watch. We’ll go an hour at a time. Otherwise, we might get bored and fall asleep, or not notice something.”

  “Hey, there’re sharks in the water!” Aleisha had her face pressed up against the window on her side of the plane.

  “Great Whites?” Nick asked, lunging across the cabin, causing the plane to rock. “Oh, sorry.”

  “I don’t think there are Great Whites in this area,” Paige said, suppressing a shudder. Sharks were fascinating and intriguing creatures. At Sea World. At the aquarium. On the nature channel. Up close and personal, she had no use for them.

  “What’s that?” Paige asked, cocking an ear.

  “A plane?” Ty suggested.

  They almost fell over each other trying to get to the front of the plane.

  “Stay seated,” she told them. They all sat down. “Ty, go up to the front and take a look.” The noise woke Connor, and he tried to sit up. Paige put a hand on his shoulder.

  “Don’t move. We think there might be a plane.” She stepped over him and joined Ty in the cockpit. She couldn’t see much of the sky through the windshield. Ty wrenched the door open, and they both stuck their heads out craning their necks to see above them.

  A plane!

  “Nick, get those flares up here. Now!” Paige yelled.

  A moment later, Nick handed her a flare, and Ty pulled a lighter from his pocket. Paige smiled when she saw that it was the kind of lighter that would stay lit in a high wind. She held a flare to the flame until it caught, then stuck it out the door and let the orange smoke drift upward. They all watched as the plane continued on course, headed west.

  There were groans when they realized that the plane hadn’t seen the signal. Then it banked to the left
and turned around again. They all whooped and cheered.

  Paige watched the plane drop down. For a better look? The plane was getting closer and closer. As it passed over them again, a door opened and a man stood braced in the doorway. Wade Culver. And he held a rifle.

  Bullets sprayed, breaking a couple of windows. Paige heard Aleisha screaming, Connor moaning, and Alex’s soft voice trying to calm Aleisha down.

  The plane banked and came over them again. She and Ty ran for the rear of the plane where there was more protection as gunfire rained down again. When the plane passed, she peeked out the open door.

  Both of the pontoons had been hit.

  They were taking on water. Great. Now they were stranded at sea on a plane that was sinking. At least the gunfire seemed to have dispersed the sharks. But how long would they be gone? Alex and Aleisha both had open wounds and Connor was still bleeding. Paige looked down at him. He was unconscious again. She sent up a little prayer and tacked on one for the rest of them, then turned back to the group.

  “What do we have that floats?” Paige asked. Everyone looked in their packs and around the cabin. Paige remembered that she had her Mae West in her backpack. She pulled it out, blew it up, and strapped it around Connor. He moaned but didn’t awake. She had to do something about his bleeding. The nylon tarp was neatly folded at the bottom of her backpack, a roll of duct tape on top of it. The tarp was waterproof. Waterproof had to be blood proof, didn’t it?

  Paige used her knife to cut off a square of the tarp, padded Connor’s injury with another shirt, and placed the nylon over it. She ripped off lengths of duct tape and placed them over the nylon tarp and makeshift bandage, making sure the entire thing was covered with duct tape. That was going to be a bitch to get off, and Paige didn’t envy him the loss of hair and skin.

  “Hey, the seat cushions look like they’ll float,” Nick said as he ripped one off a seat. And she had thought that had always been a joke.