“I don’t care what the pilot wants to do or doesn’t want to do. I’m not spending another second having my daughter out there alone.”
“Vik is with her,” Kates said quietly and Damien roared, “Don’t anyone mention that man’s name to me again! If he had done his job properly, my daughter would have been with us on that raft instead of left alone to deal with cutthroats and assassins and…” His voice choked.
Michael said, “I’ll talk to the pilot.”
“Yes sir. Of course, sir,” Windom stammered. “I’m only saying it—”
“Never mind,” Damien snapped. “I’ll talk to him myself.”
Chapter Six
The captain had hurried out after Damien Reynolds.
Michael uncharacteristically put a hand to his throbbing head. What now? Where the hell was she?
“I meant what I said, Mr. Reynolds.” The SEAL was still standing there.
Michael looked at him, confused for a moment. “Oh, about the, ah, the agent. Yes. I’m sure he did, is doing, his very best.”
“He’s about the only guy I know who could take on two Czech sons of bitches like that and make it out alive. I know the cap there said not to get your hopes up, but I wouldn’t count old Vik out just yet.”
The annoying secretary of state fellow puffed up his chest. “I wouldn’t say he’s exactly done a very good job of it so far.”
The SEAL cocked his head at him. “Well, we’ll see about that, won’t we?”
Vik hoped to God they’d run into land soon. The morning sky had turned black. A storm was brewing and to top it off they were almost out of gas. Trying to conserve the last little bit, he had switched the motor off and let the boat drift with the tide.
Samantha was asleep on the cushions in the back of the boat. For somebody who should’ve been a spoiled, whiny bitch, she had been remarkably uncomplaining and resourceful. At some point in the night, when he had been trying to decipher a configuration of stars to better get his bearings, she piped up with the name of the constellation that had been eluding him.
His surprise must have been written on his face because she laughed. “What? I know a little about the stars too.”
“Oh yeah? Did they teach that in finishing school?”
“No, but if they had I wouldn’t have learned it. I have a strict rule about never earning a grade higher than a C, preferably a C minus. Anything I learn, I learn on my own, for myself.”
“Me too, the learning on my own part anyway, but that’s a kind of funny thing to hear out of you.”
“Why? Because I’m rich?”
“I guess it’s because you’ve had every advantage in the world. Advantages most people could only dream about. It’s kind of funny you’d want to, ah, squander them I guess you’d say.”
In the starlight, she bit her lower lip. He’d hurt her apparently. But then she surprised him again. “You’re right,” she said quietly. “I’m going to remember that if I ever get out of here.”
“You’ll get out of here,” he whispered fiercely. “I promise.”
Again, he was very good at lying, but he had hoped he wasn’t doing it right then. And now, hours later, she was asleep as the clouds gathered and a light rain started to fall. She stirred as he gently tried to cover her with a piece of tarp. Rubbing her eyes, she sat up.
“I didn’t mean to wake you,” he apologized softly.
When she took her fists away from her eyes, she pointed over his shoulder. “Look! Land!”
He glanced over to where she was pointing and thought for a minute she was hallucinating. But through the little light that was left from the darkening sky, he saw there was a sliver of what appeared to be sand. Only a sand bar, maybe, but what the hell? He got up to go back to the driver’s seat and flick on the ignition, heading in that direction.
By the time he’d cut the motor again, he saw it was more than a sandbar. A little island maybe? There was a sandy beach and then farther off trees, but as far as he could tell no civilization. Since there were hundreds of uninhabited islands in the vicinity, he figured the chances were pretty good that this was one of them. But it was better than drifting in the ocean. He beached the boat, driving right into the sand, then grabbed a piece of the tarp, and the few supplies of water and energy bars left on board, and hopped with Samantha on to the sand just as the rain started pounding really hard.
Hand in hand, they ran toward the trees.
Avery had certainly done his part. Couldn’t those goddamn Russians or Czechs or whatever the hell they were do anything right? Did he have to do all of the heavy lifting himself?
He’d sent the messages to the man on board as to the anticipated timing and the identity of the agent. The orders had originally been for the man on board to just kill the girl and the agent, but apparently the coward had demurred, not sure he was up to the job. Oh well, he’d sealed his own fate there. Those that were up to the job, hired assassins, would take him out as well.
Now it turned out even the hired assassins, who were supposed to be professionals after all, couldn’t seem to get it right. From the communication he’d gotten before he even stepped foot on the Interpol ship with Michael Reynolds, the undercover agent had managed to escape with the girl. The Czech assassins had helicoptered out shortly thereafter, claiming it was too dark to try to search for them.
Just a fiasco all around.
And now old man Reynolds was planning some kind of air reconnaissance. Goodness, we couldn’t have that. Good thing he’d unscrewed some thing-a-ma-dingy in the engine of the helicopter before he even came into the salon. Now even if the old man did get the pilot to go out in the face of this weather, his tampering would delay it somewhat.
In the meantime, he had to check in with the powers that be.
Extracting his double-coded security-proof cell from his pocket, Avery started to tap out a message.
The island wasn’t deserted. That was the first thing Vik and Samantha saw as they ran straight into the trees.
The second was it might not necessarily be very safe.
A primitive guard tower, built of wood and looking rickety but serviceable, stood about a half a mile inland.
“Maybe it’s for spotting fires,” Samantha suggested when they paused in their sprint. “You know like in the Northwest.”
They were both getting soaked through in the heavy warm rain. They couldn’t stay out in it. He needed to get her dry. But they were a long way from the Northwest U.S. and he doubted the tower was for fire spotting. Even from here, he could see a machine gun fastened through one of the slits.
Was it possible this, wherever they were, was somehow connected to Visto? He had always assumed the hidden lair of the sex trade operation was a big port, big enough to accommodate the yachts they stole to sell to the sheiks and other rich perverts who purchased the girls. But he might have been wrong about that. Interpol had never been able to find it on their own and wouldn’t a big port be easier to spot? Perhaps it was a simpler operation than he’d imagined, hidden on a remote island.
Or perhaps he was letting his imagination get the better of him. Face it, Vik, your mission’s screwed.
Well, whatever that guard tower was for, he doubted they’d just welcome them in and give them a hot cup of tea. Not with that machine gun as their lawn sign.
He looked around the trees, but saw no other shelter.
“Let me go see what that is,” he told her.
“I’ll come with you.”
“No!” The way he’d said it apparently clued her in to his unease.
“Is this where the, ah, the bad guy lives? Whatever you called it? Visto?”
“I don’t know,” Vik said honestly. “I just know it looks like there’s a gun in that tower, so I think I should go check it out first.”
“But if there’s a gun, you shouldn’t go.”
“That’s what I’m trained for.”
“What?”
He really did have to get around to tell
ing her who he was, especially since it probably didn’t matter anymore. But he couldn’t take the time now.
“Just stay here.”
“I’m not going to stay here while you—”
“If there was something you could do, I’d let you, wouldn’t I? When I’ve needed your help, driving or, er, or hiding—”
“Mostly hiding.”
“I’ve asked for it, haven’t I?”
“I guess. Yeah. I guess you have,” she said, her voice getting a little stronger. “Okay. You win. I’ll just wait here.”
He pushed her down gently. “Crouch down. You never know when they’re going to come to the window. And if I don’t signal you within ten minutes, run like hell back to the boat and get out of here.”
She nodded and he was surprised she didn’t object. Good girl. Maybe she was finally starting to take orders.
Getting through the foliage to the tower without being seen was a bit of a challenge. Much as he hated to, he kind of slunk along the wet ground until he could get right under it. The fact that he hadn’t been blown to bits in the effort at least suggested he’d been successful at going unseen.
But he had no idea who was inside. Not surprisingly, there was no staircase or ladder. But he could make the sheer climb pretty easily, scaling along one of the legs of the tower. Now, managing to climb in the window without being seen was probably more of a challenge. But there was nothing left to be done. He had to do it, if Samantha and he had any hope of getting out of this. He wondered as his hands latched onto the bottom of the open-air window frame whether having Samantha with him was throwing him off, making him less cautious in his fervor to rescue her.
The machine gun suddenly at his neck as he climbed up that last little bit gave him his answer.
Uh, yeah.
“Oh, hi,” Vik said in Taiwanese, just guessing the language of the wiry little man who held the machine gun pointed at him, as he put his hands up in an exaggerated way, backing from the window. When the man didn’t respond, Vik tried Russian. “I got caught out in this storm and beached here. I was just trying to get out of the rain. I’m sorry if I’m trespassing or something. I’ll just be on my way.”
A radio in the corner crackled, a voice coming out in English.
“Oh, you speak English?” Vik tried, pretending he hadn’t heard the mention of Samantha’s name.
“Where’s the girl?” the man responded in the same language.
“What girl?”
“You fucking moron. God, I hate Interpol. I’d spray your brains all over here if the boss didn’t say to keep you alive to see how much you know.”
Well, that was nice to hear. Talk about a fucking moron. The guy had just let him know that he was probably going to be left alive long enough to maybe overpower him. Machine gun or no, Vik thought he could take him pretty easily.
The two men who came out from the back, guns in hand, looked a little harder to take. Without the element of surprise, he might have a challenging time overcoming all three of them.
But he was very motivated.
“Oh, hi,” he greeted the newcomers. “Friends of yours?”
“Shut up.”
“So is this Visto? I have to say I’m disappointed. I was expecting something a little more luxurious.”
The three men ignored him as they conversed with each other in yet another language, not Czech, not Russian, not Taiwanese. Ah, Tamil. Well, nothing like a taste of home. What a cosmopolitan operation this sex ring was.
The men were conferring as to whether to “take him to their leader”, as it were, or knock him out first, maybe with a shot to the knees, although they thought he looked pretty heavy and didn’t relish trying to carry him.
“I’ll walk myself. Promise,” he volunteered in what he always thought of as his native tongue.
They glared at him, just as some kind of missile lobbed through the window, catching one of them on the side of his head. Vik lunged for the gun of the downed one as another missile—was that a coconut?—whirled past him toward another of the men.
With the gun he’d whipped up and the second man down, he shot them both, without hesitation, leaving only the third one, who was shooting wildly toward the window. Since Vik had half a notion who was down there, he took little time to put a halt to that. The third one went down with a clean shot to the head as well. With one last look just to make sure they were all dead, he dropped the gun and went to the window. Nobody was there, just a few stray coconuts lying on the ground.
“Hey there,” he called down. “I’m ready to be rescued from the tower now.”
She popped her head out from where she must have dove at the shots, underneath the tower.
“All clear?” she asked.
“What part of ‘stay where you are and then run to the beach’ didn’t you get?”
She came out from under the tower and, before he could stop her, started climbing up the tower, more competently than he would have given her credit for. Of course he wouldn’t have given her credit for an arm like a quarterback either, but she apparently had one. He pulled her up that last little bit and through the window. Heaving, she bent over to catch her breath.
“I have to say, that was darned impressive,” he said.
She grinned until she saw all three bodies on the floor. “Oh no. Did I do that?”
“No. I did, but I wouldn’t have been able to if I hadn’t had the expertly executed great coconut distraction.”
He crouched down next to the bodies, searching their pockets for anything that would give him a clue as to their identities or where they were. The pockets were empty.
“Did you have to kill them?”
He glanced up at her. He really was a hardened old bastard. It was good to be reminded that killing wasn’t an everyday thing, even if it was necessary. “I’m afraid I did, Samantha. I couldn’t risk trying to take them as prisoner and if I let them get away, I’m afraid they’d warn whoever’s in charge of this place.”
“Oh,” she said in a forlorn little voice, for all her bravado with the coconuts. “I see.”
A noise from a back room startled him into standing, grabbing one of the discarded guns. Jesus, he really was losing it. The first thing he should have done was to check the rest of the structure for anybody else who might be here.
He held the gun aloft in front of him and started to round a corner when she cried behind him, “Don’t shoot!” She scrambled in front of him and scooped up some little mongrel thing. “Look, they couldn’t have been that bad. They had a puppy.”
He made a thorough survey of this second room and then the bathroom, which was really more of an outhouse. There was no one else here. “He was probably their dinner,” he observed as the mutt licked her nose and she shot him a scowl, putting the puppy down.
“What now?” she asked.
“For now, I need to bury the bodies, and then we figure out the next step.”
Luckily, the rain-drenched ground was soft enough that, with the help of the shovel he’d found in the back toolshed, burying the bodies was not too arduous. The tower had a rudimentary shower—actually, more like some buckets of water strung up with a rope attached—for him to wash up in when he was done as well. Samantha had done the same it looked like, although she still wore the wet pajama things she had sported all this time as she cuddled the puppy to her. Him, he’d borrowed one of the dead guy’s shorts. They looked clean at least.
He sat at the radio. “You should get out of those wet clothes,” he said gruffly.
“Is that an invitation?” The pert response was delivered with a smile as she put the dog down on the ground. She seemed pretty pleased with herself since she’d come to his rescue, as damn well she should be. The girl had a lot of guts. He’d thought that at first, but even more so now. He couldn’t resist smiling back at her, though he knew they were probably in as much trouble as they had ever been. If the men at this outpost had not radioed in their presence before he killed them, t
hey were probably supposed to do some check-in periodically. And if they didn’t do it, that would bring attention and investigation.
The trouble was he didn’t know how much time they had before that.
Maybe he should have taken Samantha back to The Victory. Had he made the wrong split-second decision? He usually didn’t second-guess his decisions, but he found that with her safety at stake he seemed prone to it.
“No, it wasn’t an invitation,” he scolded playfully, although the sight of her sitting with her long legs curled up under her on the bunk certainly got him thinking—which was another of his problems. He was not only second-guessing himself, he was thinking about making love to her, which was just so not appropriate under the circumstances.
For one thing, they were still in a hell of a lot of danger, with no game plan out.
He stared at the radio.
“Couldn’t we put a call in to my brother?” she asked, and he knew that now was the time to tell her who he was.
Oddly, though, it was frozen on his tongue.
“I’m going to do better than that,” he finally said, turning to the radio and plugging in a special frequency.
He’d call Crenshaw.
Samantha didn’t know who Vik had radioed. He seemed to be speaking in some kind of code with whoever was on the other end. After a while, she tuned out and stopped listening. With slow hands, she peeled off her wet boy shorts and then her clammy camisole. Only when she realized that Vik had stopped speaking did she see he was watching her. The voice on the other end of the radio called out a question that made no sense to her as Vik watched her. Then the radio voice called it out again, garnering Vik’s attention finally and he finished the conversation.
She went into the bathroom and came out with a towel, rubbing her body as he watched her. The puppy was curled up contentedly in one corner of the room.
“Who was that?”
“Someone I trust. Maybe the only man I trust to get us out of this mess. Or at least the only man I trust who I can get in touch with at a moment’s notice.”
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