Lansing began a tentative, downward spiral which was more like an awkward air-machine dance toward the moving boat, since the sea breeze was not cooperative in the endeavor to place Eriq aboard the Smiling Jack.
“ Feed me any cover I might need,” Eriq asked Jessica, who readied her Browning automatic, her eyes now on any movement below, riveted to the windows and the hatches, her weapon pointed. But as the bird hovered and was snatched in updrafts and downdrafts, she would lose targeted points and had to wait to refocus. It wasn’t the best of circumstances by any means, but every minute was taking Tauman closer and closer toward Cayman waters, and she and Eriq both knew that Ja wanted custody of their monster.
Eriq tore off his headphones and started down the whipping ladder.
God, he’s gutsy, she thought. Her memory led her to a fond remembrance of a strong-willed, determined, bull- headed old friend whose like bravado had gotten him killed some four-plus years ago in Chicago-Chief Otto Boutine, with whom she’d been in love. She cared deeply about Eriq; she didn’t want anything happening to him. She also wondered if she’d have the guts to climb out of this chopper while it remained in midair, hovering above the speeding boat. She wondered if it might not come to that should something happen to Eriq, and at the same time, crowding her mind was the question of where Tauman was lurking, if he was indeed on his back from self-inflicted wounds or was merely playing the trapdoor spider, biding his time, preparing an ambush. Hadn’t Kim Desinor called him exactly that? This seemed more Tauman’s style, since he didn’t care for the sight of blood and likely didn’t care for pain of any sort either.
She shouted her fears to Eriq in a stream of warnings which he could not hear, since now he was without headphones and the noise of the machine wind alone penetrated his hearing. Still she shouted, “Be careful! Go easy! Remember what happened to those FMP cops!”
“ Your friend’s damned crazy,” Lansing, the only one who could hear her warnings, replied.
“ The guy down there may’ve slashed his wrists or taken pills,” she shouted in defense of Santiva, “and the more time we waste now, the more time he has to check out on us.”
“ The guy’s got to be alive; he’s steering the boat from inside the cabin.”
“ Could be on autopilot. That damned ship is so state of the art, it can likely run this course by itself.”
“ No, no… his course is keeping pace with the others, and he’s corrected his helm more than once since we spotted him. No auto’U do that, not in these conditions, surrounded by other boats.”
“ I’ve been told differently,” she countered. “That boat can set its own radar, respond to its own radar signals.”
“ Damn chancey to bet on it with your partner’s life, Dr. Coran.”
Jessica took hold of his arm and said, “You ever tell a Latino he couldn’t do something? There’s no way Eriq was going to listen to reason once he decided to go down that ladder. Right now, we have to do all we can to help him.”
“ I’m trying to get him down as quickly as possible, but part of my brain is asking, Should we do that or take him up? Better wc all come out of this alive, even if you do lose your prisoner. You can have him extradited later. Get the State Department to threaten sanctions or something.”
“ Maybe you’re right.”
“ I know I’m-”
Suddenly, a metal rod slammed into the bubble top, creating a spidery web of cracks that began to spread over the glass before them. “Damn! What was that?”
“ A metal part from the rotor, I think! Damn!”
“ What’s it mean?”
“ If it’s part of the rotor, we’re going down. Something like a hundred moveable parts in that damned old rotor shaft, any one of which, if it gives, we sink like a stone. Helicopters don’t glide down with the wind the way a plane does.”
“ I knew this damned old thing was old but…”
“ Are you kidding? The glass isn’t even shatterproof. We’ll be lucky if it holds.”
“ Eriq! Oh, my God!” Over Lansing’s protests, she tore off her headphone set and ripped her seat belt away. She then climbed into the rear, where Eriq had disappeared over the side. She stared down to see him holding so tightly to the rope ladder that it appeared now to have become a giant rosary upon which to plant a kiss and a prayer.
Jessica watched a dangling Eriq as Lansing fought the chopper for control, and she saw the dark, sinister shadow in an open hatch on the boat. She saw the metal spear rise like a bullet toward Eriq. When the ladder was snatched and whipped again by the struggling chopper, the spear missed Eriq by inches.
Jessica grabbed up the headphones she found on the floor and shouted into them, “Lansing! He’s firing a speargun at us! It’s not the chopper! Repeat, it’s not the rotor!”
“ Speargun!” echoed Lansing.
Jessica continued to monitor for any sign of Tauman, realizing now that Eriq was between her and the killer, but that if he showed himself at the hatchway again or at the entryway to the cabin she’d have a clear shot-if Lansing could get the damned bird stabilized.
Just then she saw Tauman-muscular, tall, ruddy- complexioned with wild hair blowing in the wind. He was armed now with a huge pistol.
“ Damnit, it’s a flare gun!” she shouted.
Lansing took the warning, instantly pulling up, but at the same time Eriq leapt for the boat, and as Tauman’s fiery missile slammed into the chopper and bounced harmlessly away and into the sea, Jessica fired. But Lansing had jammed the chopper sharply to the right, sending Jessica’s shot astray.
“ Turn back! Get us around! Eriq’s on board with that maniac, and he’s got a flare gun!”
Lansing didn’t hesitate, bringing the chopper back around in a tight arc, returning to the pursuit. “Now that sonofabitch’s tried to kill me!” he barked.
The chopper skimmed straight over the water now, catching up with Tauman’s boat. When they neared, they could see that Eriq had lost his gun in his mad jump onto the boat, but that he’d somehow managed to get hold of Tauman before he could reload the flare gun. The two men were fighting for control of the gun now, and it was pointed overhead.
Tauman viciously kicked Eriq in the groin, bringing him to his knees, but Eriq wouldn’t let go of the gun, and Tauman, too, went to his knees, unable to free the gun and control it. “Is it loaded?” Lansing wanted to know. Jessica could not say. “I don’t know. Get me closer, and I’ll put a bullet in the bastard.”
“ You got it.”
They dipped now over the boat, which the wind carried just ahead of them. The other boaters racing these waters had all slowed, staring, pointing, wondering what was going on and who were the good guys and who the bad in this confusing set of circumstances. “Get on that radio and tell those others to stay back. Inform them we’re FBI,” she ordered Lansing.
“ Good idea,” agreed Lansing, who was about to find the necessary frequency when Jessica screamed and the second flare went sailing across the cracked glass bubble. “Sonofabitch!” Lansing shouted into the open frequency, the chopper rolling and banking again in response to his reaction to the near hit. But this time Lansing held on to his emotions and the controls, keeping the chopper fairly well in place.
Jessica again leaned far out over the side, trying to draw a bead on Tauman, but Eriq was all over the monster now, pounding him and pummeling him, looking as if he might kill him with his bare fists. Tauman wouldn’t stay down, however. Then suddenly Tauman slumped into a heap, appearing either dead or deeply unconscious. She watched as Eriq lifted Tauman by his hair and battered his head against the gunwale. Satisfied that the creature had finally been rendered harmless, Eriq went below to get the ship under control. Jessica took that as her cue to board the boat. She didn’t want Eriq turning his back on this serpent.