Envy the Night

32

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They were back in the boat as the rain billowed down at them like laundry tossing on the line, flapping in gentle gusts, but each gust was a solid wall of water. Nora’s hair clung to her neck in tangles, water running into her mouth and eyes, the whole world gone wet, lake and sky blending into a liquid universe. She sat in the back with King’s hand locked into her arm, his gun close, as Frank started the engine and took them back out into the lake.

AJ’s mood was different than it had been before the island, wilder, his self-control held together by a few overstretched threads. She wasn’t sure if it was the realization of what he’d done back at the cabin catching up with him or more a sense of anticipation—it was now clear that Ezra knew they were coming.

But did he? Was he really somewhere north of here, taking refuge in the storm with Renee and Vaughn? Or had Frank been lying, saying whatever it took to get that gun out of his mouth?

The engine roared louder behind her and the boat lifted again, shoving her backward, tightening King’s grip on her arm. She’d have another set of bruises from him now, more blue streaks from his big ugly hands.

They hammered across the lake, the bow banging against windblown waves, and for some reason her thoughts turned to her mother, always wanting Nora married off and tucked away from the world, and Nora suddenly wondering if this was why. The world could send its evil blowing into your life disguised as something as innocent as a car with a smashed front end, and you’d never see it coming.

But she should have seen it coming. Had known even as she pocketed the two thousand dollars that her father wouldn’t have done it, that he’d have demanded ID and some more information, or maybe refused the car altogether.

Her focus should probably have been on the hand that was digging into her arm and the guns around her, but she couldn’t take her mind off the earnest, pleading look on the face of the man she’d believed to be Dave O’Connor as he’d put the cash into her palm and assured her he could be trusted. She closed her eyes, reopened them, tried to see the lake instead of the mistake that had taken her here.

This far north, there was nothing to see except wilderness. The trees lined the shore in unbroken formation, like soldiers from some ancient battle massed and ready for action. Here and there stumps and weathered trees jutted out of the water, and the sky was empty of the osprey and eagles and gulls that normally filled it, empty of everything but roiling clouds and sheets of rain. AJ was speaking into Frank’s ear and pointing, sending Frank along first one shore and then the other, cutting back and forth across the lake, searching for Ezra and the others. It was a random, worthless method, even Nora knew that. Someone like Ezra would be able to hide the boat so well that they’d never find it, not if they spent the whole weekend out here. He probably had it onshore by now, dragged into the woods and covered with branches and underbrush, utterly invisible.

So what then? What would AJ and his near-the-breaking-point temper do when he realized they’d never find the boat?

She hadn’t formulated an answer to that question yet when Frank abruptly dropped the throttle and the boat sloshed to a stop, rocking on its own wake. Nora stared over his shoulder and felt her stomach dip with horror and astonishment—the boat was dead ahead. Not hidden at all, completely unconcealed, in fact, just sitting there on the flooded main shore, tied among the trees, dead center in the bay, visible from a hundred yards out even in the storm.

What was Ezra thinking? Had he lost his mind?

Ezra sat in the wet leaves for a long time with Vaughn at his side, thinking about the line he’d uttered as Ezra passed him the pistol and asked if he knew how to use it. I’ve used it. Probably in ways you wouldn’t guess.

He thought about that and about the way Vaughn had reacted to being separated from Renee, the sort of desperate need he’d shown for her, took those two moments and put them together with the worry he’d had before, the notion that Vaughn was not the sort of man Devin seemed likely to turn to in a time of crisis. He considered all of those things for a while as they sat in the rain and waited for their pursuers, and after a long time he turned to Vaughn and said, “Devin’s alive.”

Vaughn had been staring out at the lake, and now he continued to do that, but everything in him seemed to shut down, not a breath coming, not a blink.

“He is alive,” Ezra repeated. “Left the hospital yesterday. Hasn’t been seen since. The way Frank heard it from the FBI, they think Devin might have been headed this way.”

This time, Vaughn got himself together enough to muster an attempt. He cocked his head, turned away from the water to face Ezra, and said, “I don’t know if I believe you, but if you’re serious, then that’s good news.”

Ezra said, “No. It is not good news for you.”

“I don’t understand,” Vaughn said.

“I think I do,” Ezra said. “I think I understand.”

Vaughn’s tongue slipped out of his mouth and ran across his lips, as if they needed moisture even with the rain beating off his face.

“Now,” Ezra said, “it being just the two of us out here in the rain, and Devin’s wife far from hearing range, I’d like to ask you a question and receive an honest answer. Did you shoot him?”

“What? Man, we sat on that porch and I told you—”

“I know what you told me,” Ezra said, “and this time I’m asking for the truth.”

A gust of wind blew hard for a few seconds, bending the treetops and showering Ezra and Vaughn with water, and then it faded and the rain slowed and the woods grew quiet around them.

“I’m the only chance you’ve got today,” Ezra said. “You better know that, friend. I’m it. And I need the truth.”

There was a long pause, and then Vaughn said, “She’s scared of him. That’s all it was. She doesn’t love him. How could you, guy like that? But how do you leave him, too? I’d be scared, if I was her.”

“You think she’s in love with you?” Ezra said. “Because I didn’t see that.”

Vaughn tensed, a quick flash of anger. “She could be. She might be. Man, you haven’t seen us, you don’t know what you’re talking about. I spent times with her, so many times, when she was telling me how much she liked all the ways I was different from him, how a guy . . .”

His voice trailed off, but Ezra understood what Vaughn never would, that Renee had been part of the game, packaged with the cash to keep this guy happy and playing for Devin’s team. Someone in law enforcement, buying him off might not be enough protection. Devin would have wanted to bring Vaughn in close, lure him as near as possible so he could be watched. You looked for something that kept a guy like Vaughn on the hook. Renee, it seemed, had played that role awfully well.

“Were you having an affair with her?” Ezra asked. “Sleeping together?”

Vaughn shook his head. “No. It wasn’t there yet. But she was scared of him, and I know she wanted to leave him, I know that for a fact.”

He hissed the last line at Ezra, spit showing on his lips.

“All right,” Ezra said slowly. Then, “Why’d you run here? Of all the places you could have gone, you came here?”

Vaughn didn’t offer an answer, but after a moment Ezra gave himself one. “You needed someplace that would seem like Devin’s idea. To convince her.”

That got a nod. “He’d talked about it once. Right at the beginning. Offered me the place if I wanted to stay there, you know, a vacation or whatever. Wrote your name down”—he nodded at Ezra—“and said I should just call you and say when I was coming. He acted like it was funny, though. Seemed real entertained by it.”

“He would have been,” Ezra said. “I promised him if he ever came back here, I’d kill him. He probably thought it would be real damn funny if you called me and said he’d sent you. If you thought you’d killed the guy, though, why did you need to run at all?”

“To be with her,” Vaughn said, his voice barely audible. “To be with her, away from the rest of it. To show her what I could be. That I could take care of her. That I could be like him, only . . . better. If she knew that he’d trusted me, if she knew . . .”

He looked up at Ezra, hope filling his eyes. “You won’t tell her. Will you? You hate him, too. You understand.”

“I am a damn fool,” Ezra said. “An old fool.”

“What?”

Ezra stared down at him, felt contempt for Vaughn and loathing for himself rising warm out of his belly.

“People are dead, and more are going to die,” he said. “For you. And I’m out here protecting you.”

“You think I wanted that? Think I wanted any of you people anywhere near us?”

Ezra didn’t answer.

“You won’t tell her,” Vaughn repeated. “Right? You said you’d promised to kill Devin. You just told me that. So you understand.”

So he understood. This sniveling, murdering little shit was looking Ezra in the eyes and seeing a kindred spirit.

“I will tell her that her husband is alive,” Ezra said.

“What?”

“He is alive,” Ezra said, “and she deserves to know that. You didn’t kill him, and now whatever you were hoping to pull off with her, it’s over.”

“It’s not over,” Vaughn said, speaking carefully, “if Devin is dead.”

It was quiet for a minute, his suggestion hanging in the air.

“No,” Ezra said. “No, we’re not killing anybody so you can get his wife. I’m not being a part of that.”

“You said you wanted to kill him.” Vaughn was pushing off the ground, his body rising with his voice. “You just told me that the reason he didn’t come back up here anymore was because you said you’d kill him. So what do you care, man? It’s nothing to you.”

Nothing to him. Vaughn was right about that. Yet here Ezra sat with him in the wet woods with a gun in his hand and a bloody mess headed his way. He started to speak but stopped when he heard a motor.

They were here. He leaned out of the trees and looked across the water, Vaughn joining him, and saw his boat out in the lake, coming to a stop about a hundred yards from shore. Ezra could see four figures in the boat, recognize Nora but none of the others. It could be Frank behind the wheel. Yes, that was probably Frank. They’d make him run the boat.

“Is Devin out there?” Vaughn said. “If he’s out there, man, kill him and let’s be done with it. Just let us go. Let me take Renee and go.”

“Shut up.” Ezra wanted to lift his gun and bring it down in the middle of Vaughn’s face, hit him again and again until his lips were smashed into his teeth and he couldn’t say another word.

The motor came back to life, and the boat was headed their way, coming into shore. Ezra watched them come, saw that it was indeed Frank behind the motor, and wished again for his rifle. It would be over now, if he had his rifle. Instead, they had to wait and let the battle come to them. It wasn’t what he wanted.

They landed the boat, and Ezra rolled back against the base of the tree, looked at Vaughn, and said, “They’re coming onshore, and we’ll let them come, okay? These guns, they don’t have the range we need. So we’ve got to sit here and wait, wait quietly.”

Vaughn didn’t answer or even nod, just looked at Ezra with blank eyes. A hell of a combat partner he was going to be. It was up to Ezra, nobody backing him up out here, no Frank Temple or Dan Matteson like in the old days.

“When they come on shore,” Ezra began, but he was interrupted from further instructions by the sound of another motor. What the hell? From where he stood, he could only see his boat, and the big Merc was shut down. He shifted a few steps to the side, knelt again, found the little aluminum boat. Yes, there was someone on board, starting the engine. Frank was on the beach, pushing the aluminum boat back into the water. Ezra had wedged it well into the sand.

Frank got the boat free, climbed in with the tall man who was at the motor, and then both boats pulled away, out into open water. Kept going until they were a good two hundred yards offshore, and then the anchor went out from the little boat, which was pitching hard in the wind.

“Shit,” Ezra said, watching them. This was a good move. A damn good move. They didn’t want to have to follow Ezra into the woods and leave both boats on shore. If they made a mistake and let Ezra double back and return to the boats, that would be end of it. With just two guys, they also couldn’t afford to leave one guarding the boats. The solution, one Ezra would have considered if he were in their shoes and felt good about how much time he had, was to remove one of the boats. With this storm keeping the lake desolate, they had the time.

“What are they doing?” Vaughn said, whispering even though there was no chance of being heard down on the beach.

“They’re moving one of the boats offshore. Far enough away that we can’t get to it. Then they’ll come back.”

They would come back in his boat, which was bigger and faster and also possessed the most important quality for this situation: It required a key to start. Take the key with you and the boat was dead in the water, unlike the little boat with the outboard and its pull cord. Ezra had no second key hidden away on the boat, but he could probably hotwire the thing if he had enough time. Finding that sort of time, though, was difficult when people were shooting at you.

Far out on the water, an exchange was taking place on the two boats, men stepping off one and into the other. They’d anchored almost directly across from the island where Ezra had left Renee, no more than fifty yards from its shore, and he hoped she was well hidden.

The exchange was completed, and it looked like Ezra had been right and they were taking the little boat on their return trip. The showdown was coming, and Vaughn didn’t matter anymore, could be dealt with later, after this last bit had played out.

If the first goal was to separate Nora from AJ and King, then Frank supposed he should count this as progress. It was hard to believe that, though, as he watched King bind Nora’s hands behind her back with duct tape, then wrap her ankles together. She’d given up on fighting him by then, but when he advanced on her with the piece for her mouth, she spoke.

“No. Please don’t cover my mouth.”

He snapped the tape over her face, wrapped it around her jaw until it tangled in her hair, and then added another, shorter strip. The fear grew in her eyes when her mouth was covered, and Frank wondered if she was claustrophobic. They had her stretched out in the small boat they’d taken. AJ kept his gun on Frank while King handled the tape work, and Frank had put up a little bit of an argument, just enough to let them think he opposed this. In reality, it was for the best. He felt bad for Nora, couldn’t meet her eyes because the panic that showed there was tough to take, but he knew it would be easier if he was alone with these two. Nora was a liability, an extra concern anytime he decided to take action. With that eliminated, he was a little freer. Now the only person who would die immediately if he screwed up was himself.

“You’re staying with her,” AJ told King, and that quickly all of Frank’s hope for this situation began to disappear. “Wait till we’re on the shore. The minute we hit that, you start watching the clock, all right?”

No, Frank thought. No clocks, no countdowns, please don’t say that.

“Ten minutes go by, you put a bullet in her head. No hesitation.”

“Won’t be a problem,” King said, and he leaned down close to Nora’s horrified face, stroked her cheek with the back of his hand. “Won’t be a problem at all, will it, hon?”

The lake and the land surrounding it seemed to tilt and spin around Frank, that time limit—ten minutes, ten minutes, ten minutes—scorching through his brain, every possible scenario filtering through, none of them any good. It was too little time.

“You can’t—” Frank wasn’t even sure what words would have followed, because they never got the chance to develop. AJ hit him backhanded with the gun, caught him flush in the face and knocked him back into the boat, almost over the side and into the water. Blood left his nose, ran down his chin, and onto his shirt.

“Get up,” AJ said.

Frank stayed down, looking at his own blood.

“Get up!” AJ screamed it this time, then almost lost his balance in a wild kick aimed at Frank’s chest that instead hit the seat above him. The boat was rolling in the windblown chop. Frank got to his feet, fat red drops of blood speckling his jeans.

“Start the engine,” AJ said, shoving him into the seat behind the wheel. “And take us back. We’re almost done.”

Frank turned the key over and the motor growled and then they were in motion, pulling away from the aluminum boat where Nora—ten minutes, ten minutes, ten minutes—waited bound and gagged and alone with King.

A sharp ache cut into Frank’s ribs as AJ leaned forward, pressing the gun against him, and shouted, “Faster!” into his ear. Nothing to do from this position that wouldn’t generate a bullet in the lungs, and the only power Frank controlled—the boat—was useless now, too. If he rolled it or wrecked it and somehow pulled off the miracle of escaping unharmed, King would still be back on the boat with Nora, watching and ready to produce the planned result without the ten-minute wait. Whatever happened would have to happen in the woods, and it would have to happen fast. Frank leaned over the wheel, holding his shirt to his bloody nose, and slammed the boat through the lashing water. As the blood began to clot and the wind tore at his eyes, he tried to coax some insight or reassurance or reminder of old lessons from that voice in his head one more time. None came. The old man had said his piece.

“Slow down and land it,” AJ shouted. There was no real beach on this part of the shore, just trees giving way to rocks. The water was high this early in the year, and some of the smaller trees near the shore were almost submerged, only the tops showing. Frank brought the boat in among them, felt the stern shudder as the prop chewed through some branches. The rain was driving into the trees, swept by that strong western wind. It was going to be a wet, slippery climb to the top of the slope.

“Tie it up,” AJ shouted, pointing at the half-submerged tree just off the bow. “Cut the motor and tie it up!”

Frank got the stern line tied to one of the protruding limbs, but the wind had pushed the boat backward so quickly that the bow was now facing away from the island, toward the thin shape that was the boat with Nora and King.

“All right,” AJ said, tearing the key out of the ignition and sliding it into his pocket. “You lead the way, and stay close.”

Stay close so Ezra would have trouble getting a clean shot. Frank stepped out of the boat and sank up to his waist, would have sunk deeper if his feet hadn’t found a stump. AJ splashed over the side behind him, and then they were both stumbling through the water, pushing branches aside. The water was cold, crawled up through Frank’s legs and into his chest even though he was already drenched from the rain. He slogged through the small trees and stumps, slipping and splashing until he was out of the water except for his feet, facing a muddy slope lined with small saplings that seemed to grow horizontally. Then one more step and his foot touched the gravel bank and he felt like it was coming down on a land mine, that clock—ten minutes, ten minutes, ten minutes—starting to tick back on the boat.

“Start climbing,” AJ said, his breath warm on Frank’s neck. He was staying right at Frank’s back, determined not to give Ezra a shot.

He fought his way up the slope, using the saplings for handholds, his feet sinking into the muck, his brain counting seconds and subtracting them from ten minutes. They got to the top of the hill and stood gasping for breath and staring into dark trees that were shaking with wind and rain. No one in sight.

“Ballard!” AJ shoved Frank forward again, toward the trees, and bellowed the name. “Ezra Ballard, if you hear this, you listen sharp. Out on the boat is the girl from the body shop. Nora, I believe is the name. You know Nora, don’t you?”

They were into the woods now, and AJ paused when a prolonged ripple of thunder threatened to drown out his words. The thunder passed, and after one flash of lightning, he began to shout again.

“The minute we landed, you started to run out of time. That girl’s got ten minutes of life left. Those ten run out, and she takes a bullet right in her beautiful face.”

They were fifty yards into the woods now, walking without purpose, and Frank realized AJ was banking completely on the assumption that Ezra was close enough to hear him. What if he wasn’t, though? They were just going to walk around out here, shouting into the wind, until ten minutes were gone and Nora was dead?

“You can stop that,” AJ yelled. “What I want is Vaughn and Renee! You send them out and this is done. Renee, babe, you hear me? Devin is alive. Devin is alive!”

Eight minutes. That’s what Frank expected they had left. Maybe seven? The climb up the slope might have taken longer than he thought. Either way, it was time to act. He’d been waiting on Ezra, praying for Ezra, but the woods around them were silent except for the rain and the echoes of AJ’s shouts.

“Come on! Let me know you hear me!” AJ screamed it, his voice fading on the last word, and then went quiet and they both listened. There was no sound.