The Jefferson Key

SIXTY-NINE

HALE WATCHED AS TWO CREWMEN YANKED SHIRLEY KAISER from an electric cart and dragged her through the rain into the prison. He’d called ahead and told them to be ready for another occupant. She remained groggy from his blow to her face, a nasty bruise on her left cheek.

She tugged at the grip of her two minders as they forced her inside.

He entered and slammed the door shut.

He’d ordered Stephanie Nelle roused from her sleep and brought downstairs to new accommodations. He intended on placing these two women together since you never know what they might say to each other. Electronic monitoring would not miss a word.

Nelle stood in the cell, watching as they approached. The door was unlocked and Kaiser shoved inside.

“Your new roommate,” he told Nelle.

The older woman was examining the bruise on Kaiser’s face.

“Your doing?” Nelle asked.

“She was being most disagreeable. She had a gun pointed at me.”

“I should have shot you,” Kaiser spit out.

“You had your chance,” he said. “And you were wondering about Stephanie Nelle. Here she is.” He faced Nelle. “Do you know a man named Cotton Malone?”

“Why?”

“No reason, other than he appeared somewhere he was not expected.”

“If Malone’s there,” Nelle said, “you’ve got a problem.”

He shrugged. “I doubt that.”

“You think you could get this woman an ice pack?” Nelle asked. “She has a nasty knot.”

Not an unreasonable request, so he ordered it done. “After all, she must look her best.”

“What does that mean?” Nelle asked.

“As soon as the storm passes, the two of you are taking a sail. Your last voyage. Out to sea, where you will stay.”

CASSIOPEIA NAVIGATED THE CHURNING BLACK WATERS OF THE Pamlico River. She’d arrived from the west, deposited by helicopter a kilometer or two from the south shore. The State Bureau of Investigation agents who’d waited for her and Davis had pointed across the nearly three-kilometer black expanse. Though she could see nothing, she’d been told about a dock that extended into the river, at the end of which should be moored a sixty-meter sailing yacht, Adventure, that belonged to Hale. If she wanted to gain entrance to the property, that was the place. Just maintain the right heading, which they’d provided-but it was proving difficult. A gale had blown in off the Atlantic. Not quite a tropical storm, but strong enough with high winds and sheeting rain. The last few minutes of her helicopter ride had not been pleasant. Davis would be nearby, waiting either for her signal or dawn, whichever came first. Then he’d move in with Secret Service agents who were amassing north of Bath.

Rain pelted her.

She cut the motor and allowed the boat to drift closer to Hale’s dock. She’d found it exactly where they’d predicted. Swells rose in the meter-plus range, and she had to be careful not to crash into anything. The yacht tied to the dock was indeed impressive. Three masts, their stout size and shape indicating that they housed one of those automated sail systems she’d seen before. No lights burned anywhere, which was unusual. But it could be the storm. Power may have been affected.

Through the rain she caught movement on the deck.

And on the dock.

Men.

Running toward shore.

MALONE ASKED WYATT, “WHY IS ALL THIS NECESSARY? WHAT happened between us was a long time ago.”

“I thought I owed you.”

“So you involved me in an assassination attempt? What if I hadn’t stopped the guns?”

“I knew you’d do something. Then maybe you’d either get the blame or get shot.”

He wanted to smack the SOB in the jaw but realized that would be fruitless. He stared around at their confines. The water level on the floor remained at ankle level.

“So why not just kill me? Why all the drama?”

“It doesn’t matter anymore.”

“Which means you now owe somebody else more.”

“It means it doesn’t matter anymore.”

He shook his head. “You’re a strange bird. You always have been.”

“There’s something you should see,” Wyatt said. “I found it while you were sleeping.”

Wyatt angled the beam down the rock corridor. Twenty feet away, carved into the stone, gleaming from moisture and encrusted with algae, was a symbol.

Malone instantly recognized it as one from Jackson’s message. “Any more?”

“We can find out.”

He glanced upward from where they’d fallen. No way to climb back up. A good thirty feet of air stretched overhead, the walls a slick mass of slime. Not a handhold anywhere.

So why not. What the hell else was he going to do?

“Lead the way,” he said.

HALE DECIDED TO GRAB A FEW HOURS OF SLEEP. THERE WAS NO way they could make it to sea in this weather. Adventure was good, but every ship had its limits. He’d already ordered Kaiser’s rental car locked away, off premises, where it could not be found. He still hadn’t heard from the two men sent to Kaiser’s residence and he had to assume that they were either dead or captured. But if they had been captured, why hadn’t law enforcement already descended on him?

He left the prison and headed for his cart.

An alarm sounded.

His gaze shot to the darkened trees surrounding him, in the direction of his house. No lights could be seen.

A man burst from the prison and sloshed through the standing water, running his way.

“Captain Hale, there are intruders on the premises.”

CASSIOPEIA HEARD THE ALARM, THEN THE STEADY RAT-TAT-TAT of automatic weapons fire.

What was happening?

She leaped from the boat, taking a line with her, which she tied to a piling.

At the top of the ladder she found her weapon and turned for shore.

HALE RUSHED BACK INTO THE PRISON. HE’D HEARD THE DISTANT gunfire. A disturbing sound within his fortress of solitude. He found a phone and called the security center.

“Ten men entered the estate from the north perimeter,” he was told. “They tripped motion sensors and we spotted them on camera.”

“Police? FBI? Who are they?”

“We don’t know. But they’re here, shooting, and they don’t act like police. They’ve cut power to the main house and dock.”

He knew who they were.