005 Hit and Run Holiday (12 page)

Suddenly someone was shouting, and before Nancy had a chance to move, the shout rang out again, loud and clear and furious. It was Lila, standing on the deck of the
Rosita
and pointing straight at Nancy.

“Stop her!” Lila screamed. “She’s got a boat! Stop her!”

Nancy spun around to face the crowd of partiers. They were still milling around at the water’s edge. All but one. That one—the maintenance man—had broken away from the group and was loping across the sand toward Nancy.

Nancy knew there was no longer any sense in trying to get the boat in the water. She’d never make it. She’d been caught, and as she watched the maintenance man closing the gap between them, she wondered if she’d been caught for good.

For a split second, Nancy stood rooted to the spot and ready to give up. But when she actually heard the sharp, steady breathing of the man, she snapped to attention. Come on, she told herself. You can probably outrun that creep. And if not, you can certainly outthink him!

In a flash, Nancy was off, her heels sending out sprays of sand as she headed away from the boats and the bonfires toward the dark center of the island. She had no idea what she’d find there, but it couldn’t be any more dangerous than what she was leaving behind.

Nancy kept running, plunging through the sand until finally the broad, empty stretch of beach gave way to palm trees and undergrowth. It was suddenly very dark, which was good, but she couldn’t see a thing, and the tangled vines and bushes made it impossible to run quietly, which wasn’t so good. She knew she sounded like a scared deer crashing through a forest. She also knew that if Mr. Friendly couldn’t see her, he could hear her, since she could certainly hear him, crashing along right behind her, and he was much too close for comfort.

After a few minutes, the clumps of trees started to thin out, and Nancy realized she was heading uphill. She forced herself to keep going, thinking that at least Lila wouldn’t take
off. She couldn’t take that chance, not as long as Nancy was on the run.

Nancy ran until she was no longer under the safe cover of the trees. She burst out into an open space, under a bright moon, and looked around wildly. If she didn’t find someplace to hide soon, the maintenance man could just bide his time until she collapsed.

He might already be doing that, Nancy thought. She couldn’t hear him anymore, but she knew he couldn’t be far behind.

Struggling to keep her balance, Nancy scrambled up a steep incline, and then she stopped, gasping more from fear than from exhaustion. She was on some kind of cliff, and below her—in a sheer, thirty-foot drop—was a smooth stretch of sand, sparkling in the moonlight. Unless she managed to turn herself into a mountain goat, there was no way she could get down.

And at that moment, Nancy heard heavy gasping sounds. The maintenance man. He was closing in fast, and she knew she was too tired to go through another chase scene with him. She would have to face him. Glancing frantically around, she saw three large rocks grouped together. As the breathing grew louder, Nancy rushed over and hid herself behind them.

In seconds, the maintenance man was on
the cliff. As Nancy watched, peering between two of the rocks, he stopped to get his breath, then turned and began walking slowly in Nancy’s direction, looking everywhere for signs of the girl he’d been chasing.

Her heart pounding, Nancy made herself wait until he was so close to her hiding place that she could reach out and touch him. Then, in one swift move, her leg shot out, sweeping his feet out from under him, sending him sprawling on the ground.

The maintenance man was caught completely by surprise, and Nancy was just trying to decide what to do with him when she heard a shout. She looked up, and there, on the edge of the cliff in the bright moonlight, stood Dirk Bowman.

T
HE MOMENT
N
ANCY
paused, the maintenance man took action, throwing her aside in one strong movement. Nancy was outnumbered, but she wasn’t about to give up.

She and the maintenance man faced each other, squaring off like boxers in the ring. Out of the corner of her eye, Nancy saw Dirk Bowman rushing toward them. Lashing out at the maintenance man with a kick, she spun around to face Dirk.

But Dirk Bowman ignored Nancy. Instead, he caught the maintenance man with his left hand, and, swinging his right arm up from somewhere around his knees, crashed his fist
squarely into the man’s jaw. Lila’s boy gasped, sank to his knees, then pitched forward onto his face. He wouldn’t be chasing anybody for quite a while.

Stunned, Nancy looked at Dirk, who was rubbing his knuckles and grinning at her. “I’ve been wanting to do that for a long time,” he said.

“Who are you?” Nancy asked warily. “How did you get away? And what happened to my friends?”

“Your friends helped me get away,” Dirk told her. “And they’re safe. They’re waiting for us right now, in the launch we stole. Now come on,” he said, reaching for her hand, “let’s get going. I’d love to take a nice romantic stroll in the moonlight, but we just don’t have time.”

Nancy pulled her hand away. “I’m not going anywhere until you tell me who you are.”

“I’m a police detective,” Dirk said calmly. “I’ve been working undercover for two months, trying to get enough evidence against Lila to stop her operation for good.” He started walking again. “Why don’t you walk behind me?” he suggested, grinning at her over his shoulder. “If you think I’m leading you into a trap, you can always jump me again, the way you did on the
Rosita.”

Nancy didn’t think she had enough energy left to jump anybody. She really wanted to
believe Dirk, but she was still suspicious of him, so she followed his advice and stayed about five feet behind him. “Why didn’t you tell me who you were when we first met?” she called out.

“I couldn’t risk it,” he said. “If my cover had been blown, there would have been no way to stop Lila. Besides, the lady would probably have killed me.”

“But you knew what was going on,” Nancy reminded him. “Wasn’t that enough evidence?”

“We suspected, we didn’t know for sure. We needed witnesses,” he explained. “And even after I started working for Lila, it was a long time before she trusted me with her little secret. In fact,” he said with a laugh, “you and your friends were my first assignment.”

“Me and my friends?” Nancy asked. “What about before that? What about my windsurfing accident? You didn’t have anything to do with that?”

“Nope. My guess is that one of Lila’s boys saw us together and reported it to her, and she told him to take care of you,” Dirk said. “She still didn’t trust me then. But I put on a pretty convincing act, and finally she decided I was okay.”

“So tonight, when you came down to the hold, you were supposed to kill us, right?” Nancy asked.

“Right.” Dirk stopped and turned, looking at Nancy. “I wasn’t going to follow Lila’s orders, of course. But Bess never gave me a chance to tell you that, and when I came to, you’d already taken off for the island. How did you get here, anyway?”

“I swam!” Quickly Nancy told him everything that had happened since she’d escaped from the
Rosita.

As Dirk listened his eyes lit up in admiration, and when she finished he gave a low whistle. “You’re really something, Detective.” He held out his hand, and Nancy shook it.

“But just think,” he went on, his eyes twinkling mischievously, “if you hadn’t knocked me out, you could have saved yourself that swim.”

Nancy started to argue, but when she caught the look in his eyes, she found herself laughing instead. He grabbed her other hand, and the two of them began running together.

Soon they were back in the trees, and it wasn’t long before Nancy heard the distant strains of rock music and laughter from the party to nowhere. Halfway back to the shore, Dirk started heading to the right. “The launch is around a curve in the beach,” he told Nancy. “We’ll use the trees for cover.”

“How did you get it there without anyone hearing the motor?” Nancy asked.

“Kim navigated and the rest of us paddled,”
Dirk replied with a laugh. “We made a great team. The only thing we really had to worry about was Lila spotting us from the
Rosita.
But I guess she was too busy making sure you were brought back to notice us.”

“She must be wondering what’s taking that guy so long,” Nancy said. “She’s probably getting very antsy.”

Dirk laughed again. “Wait’ll I come after her with four or five other cops. Then she’ll know what antsy really is!”

Nancy began to forget about sore feet and sore muscles. She forgot about everything but leaving the island, and when they finally caught sight of the sleek little speedboat waiting a few feet from the shoreline, she grabbed Dirk’s hand again and pulled him along behind her as she broke into a run.

“Finally!” Bess’s voice cried out. “We’ve been sitting in this boat so long I was beginning to grow barnacles!”

Nancy laughed and splashed into the water. “You think
you’ve
had it bad,” she joked as she reached the boat. “Wait’ll you hear what
I’ve
been through!”

There was no time to exchange stories, though. In spite of what Dirk had said, he and Nancy knew that Lila wouldn’t wait forever. If she discovered that they’d escaped, she might just take off, maybe for another country. That would leave the police with no one to arrest
but her troop of handsome boys. Dirk didn’t want that, and neither did Nancy. They both wanted Lila Templeton caught.

Quickly Nancy, Dirk, and George pushed the speedboat far enough out so they could lower the engine into the water. When they climbed in, Dirk slid into the driver’s seat and turned the key. The engine caught with a roar, and as the boat pulled smoothly away from the island, the six passengers laughed with relief.

“I never thought I’d say it,” Bess admitted, “but I’ll actually be glad to get back to River Heights.”

“But you haven’t fallen in love yet,” George teased. “Are you sure you don’t want to stick around?”

“No thanks!” Bess said. “There are plenty of guys at home.”

“Hey, what about me?” Dirk joked. “I thought you said you’d spend the rest of your life with me if I just got you off the
Rosita.”

Bess giggled, and leaning forward, planted a kiss on his cheek. “You’re fantastic, Dirk,” she told him, “but I’m afraid that was a promise I just can’t keep.”

Everyone laughed again, but Nancy stopped suddenly as she became aware of another sound. Even over the whine of the speedboat, she could hear it—a heavy throbbing, almost a rumbling, like a powerful motor. She glanced
around. Maria was staring out the back of the boat, her eyes wide with fear.

“Maria?” Nancy said. “What is it? What do you see?”

“Look,” Maria said, pointing. “She’s found us!”

Straining to see, Nancy could just make out a large, dark shape looming behind them. It didn’t stay dark for long, though. As Nancy watched, the deck and rail lights of the
Rosita
flashed on.

The
Rosita
was only about a hundred feet away, its powerful engines louder than ever as Lila Templeton aimed it straight at the tiny speedboat.

Bess stood halfway up and let out a scream. “She’s going to ram us!”

“I’m afraid that’s exactly what she has in mind,” Dirk agreed. “And if she gets close enough, she’ll probably take a few shots at us, too. The lady is definitely desperate.”

“I thought the party was over,” George said grimly, “but it looks like it’s just getting started.”

The speedboat was fast, but so was the
Rosita,
and as the six of them watched, Lila’s powerful boat surged through the water, shortening the gap between them.

“Can’t we go any faster?” Nancy called to Dirk.

“Not much,” he told her. Slipping an arm around her shoulder, he pulled her head close to his lips, speaking quietly so the others wouldn’t hear. “We’re low on gas,” he said, “and I’m not sure how long we’ll last if she decides to chase us all over the Atlantic.”

Shivering with tension, Nancy stared at the gas gauge. The arrow was hovering around the one-quarter mark. It might be enough to get them back to Fort Lauderdale, but only if they made a beeline for it. If they had to do many fancy maneuvers to get away from Lila, they’d never make it.

At that moment, Nancy heard a faint popping sound, something like a firecracker. She turned and saw one of Lila’s boys on the top deck of the
Rosita.
He was braced against the rail like a sharpshooter, aiming a long-barreled rifle at the six people in the speedboat.

“Everybody, down!” Nancy shouted.

“If they get much closer, he’ll be able to pick us off one by one!” Bess cried out, as she huddled in the bottom of the boat.

“Us or the engine!” George exclaimed. “And if he hits the engine, there won’t be anything left of us to pick off!”

Dirk fumbled around on the floor and pulled up the revolver that Nancy had kicked out of his hand a few hours before. “It’s hardly a rifle,” he commented wryly, “but it’s better than nothing!”