The First Casualty

33

Realizing Maria’s reaction to his imminent departure might be softened by an evening together, Jason had made arrangements to be picked up by a charter aircraft the following day and flown to San Juan, where his travel options would be far greater than those out of Saint Martin. He really wouldn’t lose a day.

That’s what he told himself. In a remarkable job of self-delusion, he convinced himself not having seen Maria for over a month, not even having lived with a woman’s company (the grandmotherly Mrs. Price excepted) had no more to do with the decision than, say, the fact the afternoon’s activities had whetted a sexual appetite he had all but forgotten.

Pulling the Suzuki’s right two wheels up onto the curb, the locally accepted manner of parking, he managed to wedge the diminutive vehicle between one of the ubiquitous motor scooters and another rental car, identified as such by the quaint custom of leasing the car without the spare tire. He joined Maria at the open entrance through a brick wall. Next to the opening, so narrow as to admit one person at a time, was only a faded wooden sign, eddy’s.

Eddy’s is as much a Saint Barts’ tradition as are one-piece bikinis. Entering tropical landscaping, Jason and Maria were under what appeared to be a thatched roof, although closer inspection revealed a more conventional ceiling above. The theme of wood was everywhere from tables of highly polished teak to massive posts supporting the faux roof to primitive carvings. A long bar ran along the right-hand side of the room with the kitchen area behind. In organized chaos, serving personnel scurried back in forth bearing trays of drink and food. No one was busier than Eddy himself. Salt-and-pepper beard and queue hung down the front and back of his white chef’s coat as he stopped at each table, old customer or novice, to exchange a few pleasantries. As they were seated by a young woman, Jason and Maria declined menus.

“Do you always have to take the Wild Bill Hiccup seat?” she asked.

Though educated in America, her familiarity with folk heroes was not always right on.

“I believe the gentleman’s name was Hickock.”

“Whatever. You always take the seat with its back to the wall.”

Basic security training.

But he said, “I understand it’s good for the health.”

“It wasn’t for Hiccup or whatever his name was. He was shot in the back, wasn’t he?”

“Point made. He wasn’t facing the door at the time.”

The waitress’s arrival interrupted.

“Do you have the tuna, tuna, tuna?” Maria asked hopefully.

A combination of tuna — sashimi, sushi, and seared — served with rice and wasabi ice cream. It was the favorite of Eddy’s habitués. Due to the vagaries of cooperation from the local fish population, it was not printed on the menu. It was with anticipation that the couple sampled a pre-dinner cocktail of Havana Club Añejo Blanco and tonic. Jason would have preferred scotch, but the house’s choices of rum were far superior to its selection of whiskey. Oh well, when in Rome…

“You never told me you were leaving Sark,” Maria observed with more than an ascertainable trace of bitterness. “I was going to surprise you by showing up. Can you imagine how embarrassing it was to admit to Mrs. Price I had no idea you had left?”

“Mrs. Price isn’t paid to embarrass; she’s paid to keep house. Besides, I left unexpectedly.”

Her eyes narrowed slightly, a certain signal Jason was about to be subjected to an old-fashioned third degree. “An unexpected trip to Saint Barts? You can do better than that.” She waved a hand indicating the whole room. “Just what business on Saint Barts was so urgent you didn’t have time to text me?”

The question was never answered. Instead, Jason’s attention was on two men who had just entered the dining area. They had not come in the main entrance, but from the side, where a door from the adjacent dress shop opened into a small space flanked by Eddy’s toilets. These men did not look like they had been shopping for dresses.

They looked more like they were shopping for trouble. Big, dark men with hard faces, eyes that searched the room, light jackets despite the air’s moist warmth. Jackets to conceal weapons. Each with the beard decreed by Mohammed to distinguish his people from the pagans.

Someone had tracked him here by following Maria, no doubt the same someone who had employed Natalia, the female assassin.

And the killing knife and Glock were safely hidden from Maria’s view at the Village Saint-Jean, so certain he had been they would be not be needed for one evening on Saint Barts. He felt as though he had just entered a formal ball room only to discover he was naked.

“You haven’t answered the question,” Maria persisted.

Jason stood, pointing across the room and smiling like a man who has just recognized an acquaintance. “I’m going to walk away from the table,” he said as quietly as the room’s noise would permit. “Two men, maybe more, will follow. No, don’t look around! As soon as they are no longer between you and the exit, get out of here.”

He pushed the car keys across the table.

“But, I don’t understand. Why are they…?”

“Maria, we don’t have time for explanations. Just do as I say.”

“But, where will I go?”

Jason was already backing away. “The bar at the Carl Gustaf. If I don’t show, just stay out of sight until tomorrow. A Tradewind Aviation charter will be at the airport tomorrow around eleven a.m. Be on it!”

She protested something he couldn’t hear as he crossed the room, selecting a table next to the bar. A man and a woman looked up from their dinner as Jason sat between them.

He put an arm around the astonished man, leaning over to kiss the cheek of the equally surprised woman. “Jack and Mary!” Jason was speaking loudly. “God, I haven’t seen you since… When? Was it two years ago at Saint-Tropez?”

The man struggled free of Jason’s grasp. “I think you make the mistake,” he protested with heavy French accent.

The two men flanked the left side of the table. In the background, Jason saw Maria headed for the street.

“And you, Mary,” Jason continued boisterously, “how do you do it? I mean, you look younger than ever!”

Jason could only get brief glances of the approaching men as he carried out his plan. By now, they were within a few steps of the table, each reaching inside his jacket. Nearby conversations went quiet, aware something unusual was going on.

In near choreographed unison, both men withdrew pistols, Russian Makarovs, the knock-off of the Walther PPK that had been the standard Soviet military sidearm until 1991. There were screams and sounds of chairs crashing to the floor as Eddy’s customers forgot dinner and drinks and headed for the exit.

Jason waited for the men’s arms to straighten, bringing the guns to bear. A split second before that happened, he lunged to his feet, fingers gripping the table.

Table, chairs, dishes, glasses crashed to the floor, sending the two gunmen stumbling backward. They regained balance and now stood behind the overturned table. Jason was jumping up on the bar. In a single motion, he stooped, scooping up a filet knife from where a gaping chef had been preparing a snapper. Spinning like a ballerina, he threw the blade, sending steel glittering in the dim light like a comet.

There was a thump, as steel bit into wooden tabletop. Not exactly the result Jason had hoped for, but enough to make the two would-be assassins keep their heads down long enough for him to reach a cluster of plates under a heat lamp awaiting delivery to tables now largely empty. The first one skimmed a head that had popped up from behind the table. The next left a reddish goo as it shattered against the teak tabletop.

One of Eddy’s better Creoles.

A food fight out of Animal House wasn’t going to keep two killers at bay very long, and Jason was running out of ammunition anyway. He was taking aim, though, making sure each plate hit the center of the tabletop so as not to alert his adversaries that he was moving toward the street entrance.

Outside, a group of the curious had gathered.

“What’s going on?”

“Who are those guys with the guns?”

“Are you the one they’re after?”

For the second time that day, Jason heard the pulsation of a police siren. Judging by the distance, plus the normal evening traffic jam on Gustavia’s streets, they weren’t going to get there in time to be of any help. He took a quick look around. Those guys inside were going to come spilling out there any second, ready to start shooting. Jason seriously doubted they would give a damn whom they shot as long as the tally included him. A quick calculation told him he probably did not have the time to get out of sight before the excitement got under way. Without success, he tried to shoo away the closest gawkers.

He returned to the street entrance of the restaurant and grabbed the worn wooden sign. The rotted wood tore from its securing nails with little effort. By the time the first assailant emerged from Eddy’s, Jason had the sign firmly in both hands. Holding it like a bat, Jason delivered a home run cut that caught the man across the forehead. The man dropped to his knees as though shot.

The Makarov slid from his hand just as the second man squeezed through the wall’s narrow aperture. Jason dove for the sidewalk as a shot sent the crowd scattering. Rolling to his left, he snatched the pistol the first man had dropped. He hoped it was ready to fire; there was no time to cock it.