Louis, however, grabbed a cushion and a cotton throw from a love seat.
Before I could reach for another cushion, the Jack Russell terrier exploded from the gangway, back bristled, teeth as big as a Doberman’s. He took two surprisingly long jumps, ducked his head, and leaped at my throat.
I ducked, and he sailed over me. Louis swatted him out of the air with the cushion, jumped on him when he hit the floor, and wrapped up the dazed pooch nice and snug and safe in the cotton throw. We used zip ties to keep him that way, though we could not control his shrill, panicked whines, which must have been relatively normal sounds for the dog to make because the man now coming down the gangway seemed irritated but unalarmed.
“If you take a dump before I can let you out, you are a dead little terrorist,” he called in warning as he exited the gangway. “Napoleon, I swear-”
Wearing nothing but red athletic shorts and the silver lighter on a thin chain around his neck, Phillipe Rivier halted at the sight of us aiming pistols at him from less than twenty feet away.
The man who’d ordered his Jack Russell terrier to attack me near the Hôtel Lancaster didn’t yelp, or shrink, or show any outward sign of fear. He just glanced at the open sliding glass door before raising his hands and calmly said, “What do you want? Money? I keep very little aboard, and-”
“We want Kim Kopchinski,” Louis said.
Rivier acted bewildered and said, “Wrong yacht. There is no-”
“We’ve got the right boat,” Louis said. “Now, where is Kim? Or should I put a hole in your kneecap to make you remember?”
Rivier’s calm demeanor vanished. He snarled softly, “Do you have any idea who you’re fucking with here?”
“You’re Phillipe Rivier,” I said, pulling off my hood. “You pose as an import-export entrepreneur. But behind the cover you’re a middleman and silent financier in everything from illegal arms deals to heroin smuggling and human trafficking. It seems there’s nothing you won’t do for an illegal buck, which is why you spend most of your time in international waters with bodyguards, and a vicious little dog for your only real companion.”
Rivier hardened. “You should have kept the hood on, Morgan, because now that I know who you are, I’m going to make sure that you and Private-”
Louis snapped, “You’re doing nothing to him or to Private. We’ve got a copy of that memory stick you use to track your black businesses. That’s how we figured out you have Kim. You were disciplined and careful with the codes and initials and all, but you couldn’t help putting a couple of pictures of your dog on the drive, and one with your brother in the background.”
“Luckily, I recognized the little terrorist,” I said. “And Investigateur Le Clerc of the French National Police in Marseille recognized your brother, Benoit, who, it turns out, is gay, lives in Le Marais, loves Kim, and hates your guts. He told us exactly where to find you. So do the world a favor: shut the fuck up, Mr. Rivier, and go facedown on the floor, hands behind your head.”
Rivier remained furious, but he dropped to one knee and made to put his hands on the ground. That’s when I caught a flicker of motion through the window behind Louis.
The Nose was out there on deck with some other guy. Both men were crouching to aim through the window.
Chapter 74
THROWING UP THE Glock, I shouted “Down!” at Louis and shot two wild rounds at the window. They sounded like cannon fire inside the cabin. Neither bullet connected, but they were close enough to make the two men dive for cover and hesitate to return fire.
“Kill them!” Rivier bellowed.
Louis grabbed the middleman and hauled him up in front of us as a shield.
I put my gun to Rivier’s head and said, “Wrong suggestion, Phillipe. Tell your boys to come in here, or we will do the world a favor and kill you. You’ve got five seconds to decide. Five, four, three…”
Rivier looked as if he’d eaten something rancid, but finally shouted, “Nez! Captain! Lower your weapons and come in here.”
The Nose appeared first, his pistol still up, looking for a clear shot at us, but finding none. We, however, had him dead to rights, and he knew it.
“Drop the weapon, and kick it away,” Louis said.
Rivier’s goon looked at his boss, who nodded. The Nose let the gun slip from his hand. It fell to the carpet and he toed it away.
“Bien,” Louis said. “Now, on your belly, hands behind your head, feet wide. You, same thing.”
The captain, a weathered man in his forties, put the shotgun aside before he even stepped inside the cabin and went facedown on his own. Louis had both men’s ankles and wrists in zip restraints before I did the same to Rivier.
“What do you mean to do to me?” Rivier asked after I’d shoved him down beside the others.
“Depends on you,” I said. “You can continue to stonewall us as to Kim’s whereabouts, which will force us to search the yacht, a time-consuming process that will truly piss us off and force us to take desperate measures with the memory stick, like sending a copy to the police. Or you can tell us where she is, we get her, and we leave you to your sorry-ass life, keeping several copies of your records in various locations as insurance that you will never, ever try to contact Kim again or try to take revenge against us.”
“Sums it up,” Louis said.
“How can I trust you?” Rivier asked.
“We told you the deal,” Louis said harshly. “Take it or leave it.”
Rivier hesitated, and then said, “She’s up one deck and forward. Master stateroom at the end of the hall.”
Relieved that she wasn’t dead, I said, “I’ll get her.”
“I’ll wait here and call our friend,” Louis said.
I suppose I expected to find Kim in handcuffs or tied down. But when I pushed open the door to the stateroom, it was worse than I could have expected.
Rivier had stripped her to her underwear and attached leather straps and bonds to her wrists and legs that held her loosely spread eagle on a bed with black sheets. She was blindfolded, and when she heard me enter, she started to beg in a thick, slurred voice, “Please, Phillipe. Just kill me. I can’t go on like-”
“You’re safe now, Kim,” I said, crossing to her. “It’s Jack Morgan. You’re safe and going home to your grandfather.”
I pulled off the blindfold so she could see it was true, and she dissolved into soft weeping as I pulled my knife from the diving sheath strapped to my calf. I cut free her wrists. When I did, I saw the livid tracks on the insides of her arms. There were syringes in the wastebasket.
“What has he drugged you with?” I demanded.
“Heroin,” she managed. “Trying to get me hooked again.”
I wanted to ask her how in God’s name she’d gotten involved with a guy like Phillipe Rivier, but I figured it could wait. The sooner we were off the yacht, the better. I found a blanket and covered her with it.
“Can you walk?” I asked.
She nodded groggily, and I helped her up. She was wobbly and leaned on me as we left her prison cell and made our way back to the living area. When she saw Rivier, she came out of her stupor and shrieked at him, “I hope you rot in hell for what you’ve done to me.”
“What I did to you?” Rivier said, amused. “You asked for it, Kimmy. You always asked for it.”
She pushed away from me, tried to go for a knife in the galley, but I caught her and said, “That only hurts you. It’s over now. He can’t hurt you anymore.”
“I’ll always hurt her,” Rivier said. “She’ll never get away from that, no matter how hard she tries to escape it.”
Kim stared at him, and then broke down sobbing in my arms.
“Get her out of here, Jack,” Louis said. “Our ride’s out there already.”