Darkest Instinct jc-4 Page 43

  Ja breathed deeply and realized that this could be a stroke of good fortune. After all, with an American agent aboard with him, when the sailing vessel carrying the Night Crawler came within Cayman’s watery jurisdiction, the FBI’s own agent could attest to the fact that the monster- who had murdered young women on the islands as well as in the U.S.-was, technically speaking, a prisoner of the Cayman Island government, and so he would become the bargaining tool with which Ja could further his own personal and professional ambitions and help his community in the bargain. This tack might lose him some favor with Jessica and the FBI, but it could gain commerce, industry, money for the islands and his people-legitimate money. After all, it seemed the U.S. wanted this bastard badly enough to make some assurances…

  Using the Night Crawler in this fashion seemed the preeminent path to take. It could open economic doors now closed to his island nation; it could mean more import/export trade, perhaps reduced tariffs. There was no end to what it could mean for the Caymans, and it would all be due to his excellent investigatory work.

  And as for a witness to this, who better than the tall, suntanned American whom he now invited along with him- Mr. Upstanding American Police Officer.

  “ We are following Dr. Coran’s footprints now. You are fortunate. Please, take a seat aboard.” Ja indicated the back hatch and the grateful agent climbed aboard.

  Through their headphones, as the chopper lifted and took off, Ja and his pilot cousin spoke in their Dutch-French tongue. “If they take the Night Crawler in our waters, we can claim him as our prisoner,” Ja confided.

  “ Do you want this scum to dirty your prison cells?”

  “ It would mean great things for us, Cousin. Trust me…”

  Ja’s cousin pursed his lips and nodded, accepting his kinsman’s words as gospel. Ja had never guided him wrong. “But I thought these people-the Americans-were your friends.”

  “ Friendship is important, not to be denied, but so too is blood; besides, I do not make the laws in Cayman. I can only enforce them.”

  “ Ahhhh,” the other man said, nodding, smiling as they made their way north across the emerald mirror below them. James Parry, fresh out of Miami, where he had jetted to from Hawaii in search of Jessica, had gotten as comfortable as his tall frame would allow in the small rear section of the cockpit. Seeing that the other two men were talking, Parry donned headphones. He only caught the tail end of the conversation, but he knew enough Dutch and French and innuendo to make out the tenor of what was being discussed.

  He wondered where Jessica was at this moment. He’d come halfway around the world to find her, to take her in his arms and to profess his love for her. In Miami the morning before, he’d been told that she and Santiva had left for Grand Cayman on a small plane. He’d managed to book a jetliner for the next morning, the flight requiring only seventy minutes. He had been in Cayman for hours, but had been unable to locate Jessica. He had tried the various hotels when finally he called the authorities, who had informed him that she and Santiva and their pilot had stayed overnight with the chief of the police department here, a man Jessica had spoken highly of-and here he was, Ja Okinleye, plotting to rip Jessica’s prisoner out from under her. What a guy, what a friend, James thought now.

  “ How far out are they?” Parry asked over the headphones.

  “ We are not sure. Be patient, Mr., ahhhh…” Okinle- ye’s voice trailed off. “I am most sorry. Did not catch your name over the noise of the helicopter. You are?”

  “ Agent Parry, Chief Okinleye.” Okinleye’s neck almost came off as he twisted to look at the stranger once again. “Parry? Jim Parry of… of…”

  “ FBI’s Honolulu bureau chief, Hawaii.”

  “ Yes… yes, I have heard from Jessica of you.” He was in a state of shock. “Did she know you were coming?” Okinleye’s mind raced. This meant Parry had likely come alone, that he was on a lover’s quest and cared little or nothing about the Night Crawler case. “Does she know you have traveled here?”

  “ No, no, she hasn’t any idea.”

  “ Aaaa… But she had to know you were in Miami? You flew in from Miami?”

  He nodded, saying, “Yes, but she didn’t know I was in Miami. Our paths crossed there yesterday, but I missed her, so here I am.”

  “ It is a strange thing to imagine…”

  “ What’s that?” Parry was confused.

  “ Imagine: Jessica Coran without a clue.” Ja laughed good-naturedly, even clapping his hands like a small boy who has learned a naughty secret. His laughter and enthusiasm was infectious, and the pilot caught the giggles, too. As for Parry, the contagion only brought on his bright smile.

  Finally recovering his composure, Ja added, “It will please her! Your surprising her here in our lush tropical paradise, Mr. Parry.”

  Parr›‘ threw up his hands. “I can only hope so.”

  “ It will be a shocking good surprise for her, one which will benefit you both, I’m sure. Do you dive as well?”

  “ Yes, as a matter of fact.”

  “ You must take her to The Wall.” Parry, like all divers the world over, had heard of Cayman’s Wall. He had never been to the Caymans before, and he knew he would love someday to make the dive down the sheer face of The Wall, but for the moment, Jessica alone was on his mind.

  “ She, I think, loves you very much, Jim Parry.” Ja’s smile was catching and Parry settled back, smiling in return, giving his attention to the horizon now. There appeared nothing and no one out there, but just as he thought so, his eyes registered the tiny dots of movement over the water-sailing vessels running before the wind like so many dolphins.

  At his feet, Parry now saw what it was he was kicking- a coiled rope ladder half hidden beneath the seat ahead of him. Rolling about also was a flare gun, fully loaded.

  Damn fools’re going to blow us all up, he thought, reaching down for the flare gun and making sure the safety was on. He snatched the flare from the weapon, rendering it harmless and placing it and the flare back into a metal container jutting from the bulkhead over the seat to his right. He then stared out toward the sailing ships again. Some were taking shape now; but there was no sign of the helicopter Jessica was supposedly out here in.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Her beams bemocked the sultry main, Like April hoarfrost spread; But where the ship’s huge shadow lay. The charmed water burnt alway A still and awful red.

  — Samuel Taylor Coleridge

  Despite the ship’s teakwood beauty and its huge, golden- orange, godlike eye-a glowing sunrise against a silken white sail-Jessica saw that it was indeed now eerily deserted, bereft of human occupancy; it was oddly still and silent even as it ran before the wind at top speed. It presented a strange, sleek, modern version of a ghost ship, its colors bright and beautifully new-too new. The other ships in the race showed tattered sails by comparison. Something strange and unusual crept over Jessica as she stared down over the silent schooner. It was as if the ship had a secret life of its own, one which it wanted to tell Jessica all about. She felt a cold stab of ice like a knife blade at her spine. Something rancid skittered about the recesses of her brain. Something told her this was it, Patric Allain’s killing ground, Warren Tauman’s place of revenge on a world that had been too unkind to him.

  “ We all three saw someone on the earlier pass,” said Lansing, a master of the obvious, Jessica thought.

  “ He’s hiding below,” added Jessica into her microphone. “We know he must have a fully automated ship to sail alone across the Atlantic. The weasel’s hiding in the cabin below.”

  Lansing was approaching for a third pass now, but this time he brought the bird into a hovering stance directly over the boat, approximately thirty feet above the bow, then eased her downward. They buzzed about, circling like an enormous bee, each of them staring, searching for any sign of Warren Tauman, a.k.a. Patric Allain, but he seemed to be playing hide-and-seek with them for the moment. Had it been like this with Manley and Stallings out on
that fogbound bay? Jessica wondered. This time a clear sky and bright sunshine burned down on the killer, as if God had turned his eye on Tauman.

  “ Bring us in closer,” said Eriq. “I’m going to board that ship.”

  “ What?” Lansing asked, his amazement complete. “Are you nuts?”

  “ There’s a rope ladder coiled at my feet, and I’m readying it to go over the side, and I’m going over after it. “You ever do a thing like that?” asked Lansing.

  Jessica knew that Eriq may have trained for such moments in his younger days, but she was certain he hadn’t made such a maneuver in some time, and very possibly never in anything but a simulated situation. “Eriq, are you sure you want to do this?” she asked. “I’m sure. I’m dropping the ladder over the side.” Eriq kicked the small door wide while continuing to shout through his headphones at Lansing. “Take the bird in lower.” But Lansing held the bird in place, the noise from the rotors and the powerful wind filling the cockpit now. “I won’t be responsible for your getting yourself killed, Agent Santiva.”

  “ Hey, you’re not in charge here, kid! I am! Now do as I say, now! Bring this chopper closer down over the boat well. I want that ladder kissing the deck. Got it?”

  Lansing scratched at the back of his head, looked to Jessica for help and asked, “Why don’t we just follow the guy into Grand Cayman?”

  “ We want to take him here, while we’re in international waters.” she reminded him. “Besides, if the guy thinks he’s cornered, given our profile on this creep, he’s liable to either attack or kill himself, if he hasn’t already done so.”

  “ But we would’ve heard the gunshot if he’s committed suicide.”

  “ Ever hear of cyanide pills. Drano, Tilex? Any of them will clean your clock,” Jessica told Don.

  Meanwhile, Eriq had managed to wrestle the rope ladder over the side. Jessica quickly and momentarily glanced back at Eriq, who’d remained frustrated at so many stages of the investigation. He’d had to wait on information to come available; he’d had to run interference for her; and he’d had to act as front man for the politicians throughout the case. He’d been equally frustrated by the killer’s notes and his handwriting, which while it had revealed so much about Tauman had remained useless without a suspect to attach it to. Now, the possibility that Tauman would be taking the quick and dirty and easy way out was too much for him, as it was for Jessica. She understood his need- compulsion, rather-to simply take action.

  Lansing began a tentative, downward spiral which was more like an awkward air-machine dance toward the moving boat, since the sea breeze was not cooperative in the endeavor to place Eriq aboard the Smiling Jack.

  “ Feed me any cover I might need,” Eriq asked Jessica, who readied her Browning automatic, her eyes now on any movement below, riveted to the windows and the hatches, her weapon pointed. But as the bird hovered and was snatched in updrafts and downdrafts, she would lose targeted points and had to wait to refocus. It wasn’t the best of circumstances by any means, but every minute was taking Tauman closer and closer toward Cayman waters, and she and Eriq both knew that Ja wanted custody of their monster.

  Eriq tore off his headphones and started down the whipping ladder.

  God, he’s gutsy, she thought. Her memory led her to a fond remembrance of a strong-willed, determined, bull- headed old friend whose like bravado had gotten him killed some four-plus years ago in Chicago-Chief Otto Boutine, with whom she’d been in love. She cared deeply about Eriq; she didn’t want anything happening to him. She also wondered if she’d have the guts to climb out of this chopper while it remained in midair, hovering above the speeding boat. She wondered if it might not come to that should something happen to Eriq, and at the same time, crowding her mind was the question of where Tauman was lurking, if he was indeed on his back from self-inflicted wounds or was merely playing the trapdoor spider, biding his time, preparing an ambush. Hadn’t Kim Desinor called him exactly that? This seemed more Tauman’s style, since he didn’t care for the sight of blood and likely didn’t care for pain of any sort either.

  She shouted her fears to Eriq in a stream of warnings which he could not hear, since now he was without headphones and the noise of the machine wind alone penetrated his hearing. Still she shouted, “Be careful! Go easy! Remember what happened to those FMP cops!”

  “ Your friend’s damned crazy,” Lansing, the only one who could hear her warnings, replied.

  “ The guy down there may’ve slashed his wrists or taken pills,” she shouted in defense of Santiva, “and the more time we waste now, the more time he has to check out on us.”

  “ The guy’s got to be alive; he’s steering the boat from inside the cabin.”

  “ Could be on autopilot. That damned ship is so state of the art, it can likely run this course by itself.”

  “ No, no… his course is keeping pace with the others, and he’s corrected his helm more than once since we spotted him. No auto’U do that, not in these conditions, surrounded by other boats.”

  “ I’ve been told differently,” she countered. “That boat can set its own radar, respond to its own radar signals.”

  “ Damn chancey to bet on it with your partner’s life, Dr. Coran.”

  Jessica took hold of his arm and said, “You ever tell a Latino he couldn’t do something? There’s no way Eriq was going to listen to reason once he decided to go down that ladder. Right now, we have to do all we can to help him.”

  “ I’m trying to get him down as quickly as possible, but part of my brain is asking, Should we do that or take him up? Better wc all come out of this alive, even if you do lose your prisoner. You can have him extradited later. Get the State Department to threaten sanctions or something.”

  “ Maybe you’re right.”

  “ I know I’m-”

  Suddenly, a metal rod slammed into the bubble top, creating a spidery web of cracks that began to spread over the glass before them. “Damn! What was that?”

  “ A metal part from the rotor, I think! Damn!”

  “ What’s it mean?”

  “ If it’s part of the rotor, we’re going down. Something like a hundred moveable parts in that damned old rotor shaft, any one of which, if it gives, we sink like a stone. Helicopters don’t glide down with the wind the way a plane does.”

  “ I knew this damned old thing was old but…”

  “ Are you kidding? The glass isn’t even shatterproof. We’ll be lucky if it holds.”

  “ Eriq! Oh, my God!” Over Lansing’s protests, she tore off her headphone set and ripped her seat belt away. She then climbed into the rear, where Eriq had disappeared over the side. She stared down to see him holding so tightly to the rope ladder that it appeared now to have become a giant rosary upon which to plant a kiss and a prayer.

  Jessica watched a dangling Eriq as Lansing fought the chopper for control, and she saw the dark, sinister shadow in an open hatch on the boat. She saw the metal spear rise like a bullet toward Eriq. When the ladder was snatched and whipped again by the struggling chopper, the spear missed Eriq by inches.

  Jessica grabbed up the headphones she found on the floor and shouted into them, “Lansing! He’s firing a speargun at us! It’s not the chopper! Repeat, it’s not the rotor!”

  “ Speargun!” echoed Lansing.

  Jessica continued to monitor for any sign of Tauman, realizing now that Eriq was between her and the killer, but that if he showed himself at the hatchway again or at the entryway to the cabin she’d have a clear shot-if Lansing could get the damned bird stabilized.

  Just then she saw Tauman-muscular, tall, ruddy- complexioned with wild hair blowing in the wind. He was armed now with a huge pistol.

  “ Damnit, it’s a flare gun!” she shouted.

  Lansing took the warning, instantly pulling up, but at the same time Eriq leapt for the boat, and as Tauman’s fiery missile slammed into the chopper and bounced harmlessly away and into the sea, Jessica fired. But Lansing had jammed the chopper sharply
to the right, sending Jessica’s shot astray.

  “ Turn back! Get us around! Eriq’s on board with that maniac, and he’s got a flare gun!”

  Lansing didn’t hesitate, bringing the chopper back around in a tight arc, returning to the pursuit. “Now that sonofabitch’s tried to kill me!” he barked.

  The chopper skimmed straight over the water now, catching up with Tauman’s boat. When they neared, they could see that Eriq had lost his gun in his mad jump onto the boat, but that he’d somehow managed to get hold of Tauman before he could reload the flare gun. The two men were fighting for control of the gun now, and it was pointed overhead.

  Tauman viciously kicked Eriq in the groin, bringing him to his knees, but Eriq wouldn’t let go of the gun, and Tauman, too, went to his knees, unable to free the gun and control it. “Is it loaded?” Lansing wanted to know. Jessica could not say. “I don’t know. Get me closer, and I’ll put a bullet in the bastard.”

  “ You got it.”

  They dipped now over the boat, which the wind carried just ahead of them. The other boaters racing these waters had all slowed, staring, pointing, wondering what was going on and who were the good guys and who the bad in this confusing set of circumstances. “Get on that radio and tell those others to stay back. Inform them we’re FBI,” she ordered Lansing.

  “ Good idea,” agreed Lansing, who was about to find the necessary frequency when Jessica screamed and the second flare went sailing across the cracked glass bubble. “Sonofabitch!” Lansing shouted into the open frequency, the chopper rolling and banking again in response to his reaction to the near hit. But this time Lansing held on to his emotions and the controls, keeping the chopper fairly well in place.