From the FireStar, a volley of gunshots.
Bullets slapped the water. Trish threw herself onto the stern’s fiberglass cover, sprawling flat on her belly, legs twisted awkwardly.
Couldn’t be intimidated. Had to keep the chase boat at a distance.
Leaning on her elbows, bracing the gun in both hands, she squeezed off another three rounds.
Blair was closing fast on the Sea Rayder, wild laughter riding on his lips, laughter born of speed and danger and “Do Wah Diddy Diddy” pounding like a movie soundtrack all around him.
He wished he still had his gun or, better yet, an automatic weapon, a machine pistol or an AK-47. Then he could be a real Hollywood hero, ripping bodies with bullets to the wail of a synthesizer in a hectic, garish dance.
Jump cut: Trish Robinson’s throat opening like a second mouth.
Jump cut: Ally Kent screaming, cut down by another spray of bullets.
Jump cut: the Sea Rayder plowing into a sandbar and igniting in a Technicolor whoosh.
Jump cut: Gage twisting backward, then dropping heavily into the companion seat, his Glock cradled loosely in his lap.
Drunk on adrenaline, Blair almost didn’t realize that this last image was no film-clip fantasy.
It was real.
Gage had been shot.
“Jesus,” Blair hissed, the truth clamping hold.
The bitch cop had hit him. Gotten him bad.
The right side of his face was peeled open to red bone. His ear dangled on a flap of skin.
Blair throttled back and leaned over his brother.
“Stay with me. Gage. Stay with me.”
Trish saw the chase boat drop back.
The guy riding shotgun was no longer firing at her. Reloading, maybe.
She glanced over her shoulder, past Ally. A dark land mass approached. The lake’s north shore No, not yet. Only the weedy hump of a small island.
Shore was still far away.
Too far.
Gage blinked, focusing blearily on Blair. His lips moved, but the feeble noises he produced were swallowed by Manfred Mann.
Blair looked ahead. The jet boat had widened the gap.
There was no time for him to minister to Gage-not if he still wanted Robinson.
He rammed the throttle forward and snatched the gun from his brother’s hand.
Facing aft, Trish saw the FireStar surge ahead with frightening speed.
Muzzle flash. The pilot was the one shooting now.
The bullet struck the stern inches away. She averted her face from a shower of fiberglass splinters.
Close.
A second shot slammed into the underside of the boat. The pitch of the engine abruptly lowered as the Sea Rayder bucked.
Hit the motor. He must have hit the motor—
Her left leg jumped.
For a dazed instant she was baffled, wondering why it would jerk that way, like a dead frog’s leg in a science experiment.
Then she felt a sudden curious numbness below her knee, numbness overtaken a heartbeat later by the worst pain she had known in her life.
It was a hot poker lancing her leg.
It was a thousand cigarettes branding her.
It was needles and electrified wires and steel claws.
Shot. Shot. Shot.
That one word caromed off the corners of her mind with dizzying velocity.
Her stomach twisted. She spat up something hot and wet.
Blood Was she hemorrhaging Had the bullet caught her higher than she realized In the gut, the lungs
No, it wasn’t blood. Wasn’t even vomit. Just saliva unspooling from her mouth in a thick, ropy strand.
The boat bounced, jarring her leg, and the pain leaped up, so strong she could hear its screaming whine in both ears, and see it too, a brilliant white glare that fogged her vision, erasing the night.
“We’re losing speed!” Ally’s shout. “I think-“
The breathless pause told Trish the girl had turned in her seat, had seen her.
“Trish-oh, God-look at you-“
“I’ll be okay.” Her mouth was very dry. “What’s our speed”
Ally checked the gauge. “Twenty-five. Still dropping.”
Trish pushed pain away, forced herself to think.
The other bullet must have damaged the jet drive-broken an impeller blade or disabled the pump.
Whatever the specifics, the boat now had no chance of outdistancing its pursuer. And in her present condition she couldn’t hope to hold off another attack.
She scanned the area. On her left lay the island she’d seen earlier, small and dark, barely more than a floating clump of reeds.
“Can you steer” she yelled.
“Think so.”
“Hook left.”
Ally wrenched the wheel to port. The Sea Rayder, cornering sharply, hurled up a brilliant cascade that hung briefly in the air, Niagara’s glistening veil.
The island swung around the boat, briefly eclipsing the FireStar.
“Jog north again,” Trish ordered.
Ally locked the wheel to starboard, then straightened it.
With agonizing difficulty Trish pulled herself into a crouch. She holstered the Glock, fastened the strap.
“Now jump.”
“What”
“Jump-and swim.”
Without waiting for a reply, Trish dived into the lake.
54
The sudden immersion was a heart-stopping shock. Agony sizzled through her left leg. Spirals of lightheadedness wheeled around her, then receded as cold water partially numbed the wound.
Beside her, Ally plunged under the surface in a bright plumage of bubbles.
They broke water together.
The Sea Rayder motored away, and the FireStar, whipping into view, veered north and continued to give chase, trailing a raucous dance-club beat.
“Come on.” Trish turned toward the island.
Ally swept a tangle of brown hair out of her eyes. “Can you make it”
“Just go.”
Ally obeyed, executing a strong breast stroke.
Trish swam without coordination or control. When her slapping palms churned up mud, she realized she’d reached the shallows.
On her good leg she pushed herself upright, then planted her left foot.
Her knee jellied. She collapsed with a hiss of pain.
“Oh, God.” That was Ally, sloshing toward her, the party dress pasted to her body in translucent folds. “Oh, God, oh, God.”
She said it over and over, the words meaningless, infuriating somehow. Sprawled in the ooze, Trish wished the damned girl would just shut up and stop making those awful noises of horror and concern.
An elbow hooked under her armpit. Ally helped her up as Trish bit back an agonized cry.
Together they struggled forward, slogging through mud.
Gage was dying.
Blair knew it, and the knowledge ate at him like acid. As he tracked the Sea Rayder, now creeping at fifteen miles an hour, he kept tossing scared, sickened glances at his younger brother.
Even in the pale light of the instrument gauges, he could see the color draining from Gage’s face as his eyes, half exposed under heavy lids, rolled up white in their sockets.
“Stay with me, bro,” Blair said pointlessly, the words lost in the engine roar.
He’d finally turned off the damn CD player. The night’s action didn’t feel like a Hollywood movie anymore. Whatever had been fun and exhilarating was dust in his mouth.
The mini-jet’s course was erratic, its speed greatly diminished. It seemed increasingly likely that his last volley of shots had hit his targets, either killing them both or at least injuring them badly enough to make operation of the boat impossible.
He could see no one at the helm or in the stem. Possibly they were slumped in their seats, leaking blood.
Like Gage.
The island met the lake in a cluster of boulders, velvety with moss. Breathing hard with strain. Ally escorted Trish through the rocks onto dry sand, then set her down behind a clump of crowfoot, speckled with pale yellow flowers half hidden among the ragged leaves.