“They’re the real thing, all right,” Jason said. “Friendlies would have signaled their intentions by now. These guys would as soon slit your throat as look at you.”
Sweat moistened Aaron’s palms.
The two positioned themselves and readied their rifles.
“I’ll take out the one on the tiller,” Jason said. “Hopefully that will discourage them. If they keep coming, I may need your help.”
Aaron had sworn to himself that as long as he lived he would never touch a rifle in anger again. “Do we really have to shoot them?” he asked.
Suddenly they saw muzzle flashes and several bullets zinged by followed by the sound of gunfire.
“Holy shit,” Aaron said, ducking. “I guess that answers my question.” Better them than us, he thought miserably.
Jason put his eye to the scope and tracked his target. The boat bounded on the water making it a difficult shot. He controlled his breathing and slowly squeezed the trigger.
POP!
The man flipped backward over the outboard and the boat veered hard left. One of the remaining three quickly took the tiller, but instead of turning about and running, he cranked the throttle and keep right on coming. The other two men continued to fire off round after round.
Jason saw no choice but to waste all three of them, and he knew that if he hit the driver last this time, the boat would stay on course a fraction longer, giving both of them easier shots.
“You take the two on the right,” he said. “I’ll be right behind you.”
Aaron held his breath, adrenaline coursing through his veins. The little boat seemed huge now, as muzzles flashed and bullets zipped by, tearing into the fiberglass and teak trim mere inches from his and Jason’s heads.
“Steady,” Jason said, taking aim again. “Smoke ‘em if you got ‘em.”
Aaron sighted in on his targets, and through the scope he could see that the man nearest him had a large tattoo covering most of his face. He breathed deeply and between heartbeats squeezed the trigger.
POPOPOPOP!
The two men on the right side of the boat cartwheeled into the water just as Jason put a bullet between the eyes of their friend. The empty boat’s motor stalled and it drifted to a stop, leaving nothing but an eerie silence.
“Well done,” Jason said, raising a high-five.
Aaron was in shock, and hardly in the mood to celebrate, but he managed to five Jason back. “Oh my God,” he said, still buzzing with adrenaline. “I thought they’d never quit!” He ran his hand through his long hair, and then touched his finger to one of several bullet holes within easy reach.
“Just another night in the Caribbean,” Jason said.
“Uh — yeah,” Aaron said, wiping the sweat from his brow. He looked out across the water to make sure the pirates were truly gone. “Will there be more?”
“Most likely,” Jason said. “But we’re ready for them, right?” He patted the stock of his rifle.
“Right…” Aaron said, feigning confidence. Maybe this trip wasn’t such a good idea after all, he thought.
He found it a little unnerving that Jason was so comfortable using his sniper rifle to kill human beings, and suddenly he couldn’t wait till they made it to San Diego.
“I should have hired you on years ago,” Jason said. “You really know how to handle a rifle.”
Aaron paused, looking down at his weapon. “I saved my mother’s life with a gun very similar to this,” he said sadly.
“Is that a fact,” Jason said.
“Two years ago, back in the States.”
“Where’s your mother now?”
“She was killed in a hit-and-run. I almost died myself, but I was thrown clear before the car exploded. All I really remember is lying on a gurney talking to a detective before going to the hospital.”
Jason suddenly felt a little uneasy, but he didn’t know why. “Put the rifles back where you found them, will you? I’m going back to bed.”
Aaron nodded and Jason went below.
Aaron took out the tattered business card he carried in his pocket. The faded lettering read:
DETECTIVE JAMES HARNESS
3rd Precinct
Brandy was in bed, clutching her blanket tightly under her chin.
Jason sat next to her. She’d been crying.
“All I could hear was that damn outboard motor coming closer and closer,” she said. “Then the shots. I thought for sure we’d all be killed.”
“It’s over now,” Jason said. “We’ll be in San Diego before you know it.”
She looked into his eyes. “I don’t like sailing anymore,” she said. “Let’s turn around and go back to Grand Cayman. We’re safer there. We’re at home there. I just want to make love and eat cheeseburgers and drink beer.”
Jason leaned over and gave her a hug and a lingering kiss. “Brandy,” he said softly. “If you knew me at all, you’d know that’s not going to happen.”
Aaron gathered up the rifles and started for the stairs leading down to the midships cabin.
Suddenly something fearfully grotesque, brutally heavy, and soaking wet leaped on his back, sending him crashing to the deck. The side of his face hit the teak planking hard, nearly knocking him unconscious. The rifles clattered some distance away.
Dazed, and spitting blood, Aaron fought back blindly, but like a wild beast protecting its young, the man was viscous and powerful, and he quickly had Aaron in a hold that would surely break his neck. Aaron struggled desperately, his breath long since gone. Blue faced, eyes bulging, he managed to free one arm and retrieve his survival knife, and with no conscious thought he flipped it open and struck madly at his attacker’s leg, driving the blade to the bone. The man cried out in pain, losing his hold on Aaron’s neck. Aaron gasped for air and yanked his knife free, and then with everything he had he turned and drove it hard into his attacker’s abdomen. Blood gushed over the knife as the man’s shoulders jerked forward and his jaw opened wide; then his full weight fell upon Aaron, pinning him to the deck. With a last great effort, Aaron squeezed out from under him, freeing his knife. He crawled a few feet away, where he lay panting on the deck, exhausted, soaked to the skin with sweat, seawater, and blood. And then he passed out.
When Aaron came to, he felt like he’d been trod upon by an angry bull elephant. He felt sick, rolling over on his side to retch.
He glanced at the body lying nearby and was shocked to see that it was the pirate with the tattoo. It was patterned after a tropical flower, and covered the man’s face, giving him a strange, hybrid appearance. The man’s eyes were closed, but he wore the surprised, open mouthed look of a man unprepared to die.
In addition to the knife wounds, the man was bleeding profusely from an apparent bullet wound to his shoulder. Aaron’s aim with the rifle had been good, but not good enough to kill.
How could he have fought so ferociously with an open gunshot wound? How could he swim that far?
He saw an empty sheath tied around the man’s waist with a leather thong, and knew he had dodged a big one. The man’s knife had no doubt gone to the bottom when he went swimming.
To his horror, Aaron thought he saw the man’s chest slowly heave. He looked again. Oh, my dear God, he thought. The ugly son-of-a-bitch isn’t dead.
Panic swelled in Aaron’s heart. He had witnessed death before, but it had always been quick, and final — never an interminable lingering between life and death. He grasped the sticky handle of his survival knife tightly — ready to spring upon the man if he so much as flinched; but then he heard a low gurgling deep in the man’s chest, and he knew that wouldn’t be happening.