Deadly Pursuit

23

Jack was feeling pretty good about things.

Seated on the sailing thwart, facing astern, he felt flurries of spray peppering his back as the motorboat plunged landward, each droplet stinging like a fleck of spattered grease.

He didn’t mind. The discomfort was minimal compared with the indignities of prison-and prison was a trap he had only narrowly avoided.

For a few tense moments, it had looked as if Steve would draw the gun and confess everything to Kirstie. Luckily his courage had faltered, and now Jack was sure the mark was his.

He’d bitten on the hook. All that was necessary was to reel him in, just as Pavel Zykmund, CSGI’s last customer, had been hauled, thrashing and flopping, into the net.

“You almost made a big mistake, Stevie,” Jack yelled over the buzz of the Evinrude outboard.

Steve gazed toward the distant runabout and said nothing.

“Fortunately I was here to remind you of the consequences. Did you see your wife’s face when I told her about our mutual friend who’d gone to jail? She was shocked, wasn’t she? Imagine her looking at you that way.”

Steve nudged the throttle arm forward, revving the engine higher. The boat bounced lightly on the water.

“You’re better off doing things my way. And she’ll be better off, too. You made the right decision.”

“I haven’t decided anything, Jack.” His voice was soft enough to be nearly inaudible. “I said I’d give you a chance to convince me you’ve got a viable plan. Go ahead.”

A setback. The sale was not yet closed. Well, it would be, soon enough.

“No problem.” Jack put all his breezy confidence into his tone and body language. “All we need is Captain Pice’s boat.”

“How are we supposed to get hold of that?”

“It’s no more difficult than stealing a car. Which I did last night without breaking a sweat.”

“Pice is a big man.”

“You’ve got a gun. Remember?”

Steve smiled, not kindly, and tapped the bundle of gear at his feet. “Don’t worry, Jack. I hadn’t forgotten. So we hijack the Black Caesar. Then what?”

“You said it was a thirty-foot sportfisher, right? A boat like that can take us to the Bahamas in less than a day.”

“The Bahamas? Oh, Christ.”

“It’s the perfect destination. Seven hundred islands, American tourists coming and going all the time. We’ll blend right in.”

“As soon as somebody recognizes the boat, we’re finished.”

“We’ll rechristen her, paint over the brightwork, make a few other modifications. Has she got a tuna tower?”

“No.”

“We can add one. That’ll change her appearance dramatically.”

“A new tower won’t come cheap. And we can’t exactly charge it to our credit cards. What do we do for money?”

“I brought ten thousand dollars with me. Twenties, fifties, hundreds. Stashed most of it in those grocery bags on the runabout after I came ashore, except for a few bills I stuck in my pants pocket in case I got separated from the boat somehow. Believe me, we won’t run short of cash for a good long while.”

“We’ll need more than money. In a foreign country we’ve got to have passports, visas-”

“A guy I know can supply us with whatever documents we require. We’ll change our names, alter our appearances, start new lives.”

“As beachcombers.”

“As anything we want. There’s business in the Caribbean, lots of it. Me, I’m planning to stay in the investments game. You’re a lawyer; my friend can get you a law degree in your new identity from any university you want. Quality paper, the kind that will check out. Then just type up a resume and name your price. Rake in the bucks, pay no U.S. taxes, and spend your weekends lying on the beach.”

“It’ll never work. We’ll get caught. And instead of two years in prison, I’ll get twenty.”

Despite the constant rebuffs, Jack could sense Steve’s sales resistance weakening as one objection after another was knocked down.

“We won’t get caught,” he answered soothingly. “Hey, you think I’m an amateur at this? Yesterday morning the FBI raided my place of business in L.A. Surrounded the building, thought they had me. And I walked right out.”

“How’d you manage that?”

“Same way I’m going to manage this. By outthinking them. They’re looking everywhere in the whole country for me. They don’t know where I am or what I’ll do next. They’re boobs, pal of mine. I can run rings around them. Already have. And if I can outmaneuver the feds, how hard can it be to do the two-step around the Bahamian police?” Jack chuckled. “It’s almost not enough of a challenge.”

Puddled water shivered on the floorboards, silver in the sun, like spilled mercury. It was cold against Jack’s bare feet. Steve’s too, most likely, but Jack didn’t think Steve noticed anymore.

“How long have you been planning all this?” Steve asked slowly.

“Years. Which is why I’ve had ample opportunity to work all the bugs out. It’s glitch-free, foolproof.” Sell it now. Sell hard. “And you can do it with me-if you’ve got the nerve. It’s your choice. Lie on the beach… or rot in a cell.”

“I’d rather rot than be anywhere-with you.”

“You don’t have to stay with me. Once we’ve established our new identities, we’ll split up. The Bahamas covers a lot of territory. We’ll never have to see each other.”

“And you’ll go on killing.”

“Maybe. But you won’t have to know about it.”

The words touched Steve like a spark. He gave a violent shake of the head. “No way, Jack. I won’t be a party to that. No goddamn way.”

“People die all the time, pal. It’s a hard world.”

“No way,” Steve said again, and Jack saw that he had come up against an apparently immovable obstacle to the closing of the deal.

Well, he had an ace up his sleeve.

“Okay.” Jack moved his shoulders in a lazy shrug. “It’s prison, then.”

“I can handle it.” Steve swallowed, trying hard to be brave. “It’s only… a couple of years.”

“More than that.”

“Not necessarily.”

“Oh, yes, Stevie. Much more. You’re looking at life imprisonment.”

“Come off it. I looked it up in the Penal Code, remember? I know the maximum sentence for being an accessory after the fact.”

“Sure. But what’s the sentence for homicide?”

“I’m not guilty of homicide.”

“I say you are.”

Jack watched Steve’s face as the meaning of his last words registered.

“You can’t get away with that,” Steve said finally.

“Can’t I? I say you were with me the night Meredith died. You helped me sneak into the pavilion. You distracted the bitch while I crept up behind her. And afterward you masturbated into her mouth.”

“No one will believe-”

“Everyone will believe it. Why else would you lie about my alibi? Out of friendship? Pretty lame, Steve. The real reason you covered for me was that if I went down, I was taking you with me.”

“It’ll be your word against mine. You’re a fucking multiple murderer, for Christ’s sake. I’m…” His voice trailed off.

Jack smiled. “Yes, Stevie? What are you, exactly? I’ll tell you what you are. You’re a frightened yuppie lawyer who’s concealed a homicide for seventeen years. And you know what else you are? You’re my best friend. We’ve stayed in touch-secretly-all this time, and after each murder I call you from a pay phone and describe it in detail, and you listen and beat yourself off. That’s our pattern, Stevie, our symbiotic relationship. I kill, and you’re my audience.”

“That’s crazy.” Strong words, but the panicky darting of his eyes betrayed how he really felt. “You can never prove any of it.”

“Prove? Maybe not. But consider this. Why did I come to Pelican Key to hide out at the very time you happened to be here? Coincidence? Hardly. I knew you were vacationing on the island, and I came to you for help. I figured you’d have to help me, because we’ve always been in this thing together.”

Steve was looking for a way out, looking hard. “Then… then why did I turn you in?”

“Attack of conscience. You couldn’t live with your guilt any longer. That much is true, isn’t it?”

“Yes. And there’s something else that’s true, Jack.” Steve grabbed at the bundle of gear with a jerky thrust of his hand. “I’ve still got the gun.”

“I’m very much aware of that.”

“What’s to prevent me from blowing a hole in you right now? Then you can’t tell any of these lies.”

Jack kept his voice calm. “No. But you’ll have to explain why you killed an unarmed man if you had nothing to hide.”

“You attacked me. It was self-defense-”

“You’re a bad liar, Steve-o. The FBI will break your story in twenty minutes. Then they’ll start to wonder what motive you had for shutting me up, and why I came to Pelican Key in the first place. Pretty soon they’ll draw the same conclusions I already sketched out for you.”

Steve clutched the bag as if grasping a last hope. “Why didn’t you say all this in the beginning?”

“I hoped it wouldn’t be necessary to threaten you. I wanted us to be friends again. Friends and willing partners. Now I guess I’ll have to settle for our being reluctant allies.”

“I… I should kill you. Dammit, I really should.”

“Go ahead. But if you do-you kill yourself.”

Steve’s hand lingered a moment longer on the zipper of the vinyl bag, then slowly released it.

“All right,” he whispered in the voice of a beaten man. “All right, God damn you. I’ll do it your way. I’ll go along.”

As always upon the consummation of a sale, Jack took a deep, contented breath and found life good.

Ahead, Kirstie steered the dinghy south, piloting it toward the dock. Steve swung to port and followed. The eastern shore of Pelican Key passed by, palm trees and casuarinas and the white beach where Jack remembered encountering Kirstie early this morning.

Hell, he wished he’d killed her then. It would have been so good, having her on the coral sand, in the warm shallows, before the newly risen sun.

Steve seemed to read his thoughts.

“She can’t get hurt,” he said, not needing to identify whom he meant.

The words were spoken with firmness; that much, at least, was not negotiable.

“Of course not,” Jack answered easily.

“I mean it. I’m serious.”

“It’s not a problem. Don’t worry about it.”

“If you even touch her-”

“I won’t.”

“If you do”-Steve tightened his hold on the throttle stick, squeezing it in a rigid death grip that bled his knuckles white-“I’ll use that gun. I swear to Christ I will.”

“Look, chill out, as we used to say in the Big Orange. I’m not after your wife. Not anymore.” Jack managed an insouciant shrug. “Plenty more like her on the islands, anyway.”

Steve winced. “No. No more like her.” He looked away, toward the turquoise water blurring past, catching and reflecting the light in a shifting scintillant display. “It’ll be hard… giving her up. Never thought I’d… have to do that.”

“Sure it’ll be hard. But it would be harder still to face her from the wrong side of a visitor’s cubicle in a penitentiary for the next forty years.”

Steve didn’t answer. He appeared to be realizing that his life-his safe, comfortable, respectably ordinary life-had ended today.

“All right.” Jack spoke briskly, confidently; he was now in full and unquestioned command of the situation. “Here’s the plan. We’ll reveal nothing to your wife. Are there any sleeping pills in the house?”

Steve shook free of his thoughts. “Yes. I’ve had some rough nights since I started worrying about all this. Kirstie doesn’t know I take them.”

“Good. Very good. Tonight, after dinner, you’ll mix a few of those pills into her coffee. Once she’s asleep, she can be tied up. We’ll lock the dog in the guest bedroom. Then tomorrow we deal with Pice.”

“Deal with him how?”

“We won’t inflict any permanent injury. Just overpower the man and restrain him. By the time anyone arrives at the island looking for him, we’ll be in the Bahamas.”

Steve lowered his head. “When Kirstie wakes up… when she finds out what I’ve done…”

“She’ll cry. She’ll scream. But she’ll survive, buddy. People do. And so will we.”

Some residue of Steve’s earlier contempt surfaced briefly in his features. “That’s all that matters to you, isn’t it? Your own survival?”

“Sure. And the same is true for you. Otherwise, why haven’t you shot us both?” He showed Steve a knowing, benevolent smile. “Don’t feel bad, Stevie. Nobody’s a hero, except in the movies. You should have learned that lesson by now.”

Steve said nothing to that. He was staring past Jack, at the runabout now easing up to the dock, at Kirstie as she stopped the motor and reached for the ladder, her movements swift and unconsciously graceful, pleasing to watch.

Jack enjoyed the sight for a moment, as he had enjoyed observing her stroll on the beach. Then he turned back to Steve, some smart and thoughtless remark riding on his lips.

The comment died unspoken. Even Jack, not the most sensitive of men, knew enough to keep silent now.

Behind the sunstruck lenses of his glasses, Steve’s eyes ran wet with tears.