Deadly Pursuit

48

Lovejoy squinted at the red radiance of the sun, furnace-hot on the horizon. Pelican Key was concealed somewhere in the sheet of glare.

“Smoke.” Pice stabbed a finger at the spray-flecked venturi windshield.

A dark plume bisected the spread of crimson light.

Lovejoy thumbed the transmit button on his walkie-talkie and asked the team leader to report.

“House on the south end of the key just went up like a Roman candle. Pilot already radioed for fireboats. We’re setting down to perform a search-and-rescue.”

“Maintain your alertness. You could be walking into a trap.”

“How bad is this s.o.b., anyway?”

“He’s the devil. And it appears he’s not through raising hell.”

A stiff wind beat at the water. The Black Caesar panted on the swells. Curtains of spray burst over the port bow, soaking the foredeck; water gurgled in the scuppers.

Pelican Key materialized slowly out of the sun’s candescence. On a level stretch of ground between the dock and the house’s flagstone court, amid beds of flowers, the Huey crouched on its skid, rotor blades still spinning. A line of tiny figures in dark blue jackets, hunched low, sprinted up the path toward the gate with revolvers drawn.

“Want us to tie up at the dock?” Pice asked.

“No.” Moore scanned the shoreline, using a pair of binoculars borrowed from the control console. “The fire’s a diversion. Like the locked storeroom in the CSGI office.”

Lovejoy had been thinking the same thing. “Circle the island,” he told Pice. “Is there another dock?”

Pice manhandled the wheel, swinging the Black Caesar to the northeast. “No. You could drop anchor in the cove, though. Or drag a dinghy aground-”

Moore interrupted. “Look.”

Perhaps half a mile ahead, a small boat glided away from the beach, trailing a white vee of foam.

“Two persons on board.” Moore adjusted the focus on the binoculars. “Man and woman, I think. Woman is seated in the bow. Blond Caucasian, must be Mrs. Gardner. The man…”

She strained to get a clear view of him through a rainbowed mist of spray.

“It’s Jack,” she said finally.

“What’s his heading?” Lovejoy asked Pice.

“Due north. Probably means to turn west eventually and come ashore on Windley or Plantation Key.”

“If we give chase, things are likely to get dangerous. I can’t order you-”

Pice brushed aside Lovejoy’s politeness. “No need for orders. I volunteer.”

He slammed the throttles open. The sportfisher plunged ahead.

“He sees us,” Moore said, staring through the binoculars, her voice taut.

The runabout hooked east, into the sun.

“It’s no use, Jack,” Lovejoy whispered. “Your luck has finally run out.”