Barbara Silkstone - Wendy Darlin 01 - Wendy and the Lost Boys (22 page)

Leaping from the desk with the weight of chicken number three caught and suspended from her ear, Marie Jean Luc, Compliance Officer of Island Insta Bank grabbed the chicken by the tushie to support its weight and ran from the office screaming for help.

I checked my watch. It was ten minutes to two. If I didn’t come up with a plan before she tranquilized her fowl, Hook’s billions would be wired to nameless accounts around the globe. Only that crook knew where the funds would end up, and he was on a polonium picnic with a no-return ticket.

My challenge was to destroy Ms. Jean Luc’s lines of communication. I ran to the wall behind her desk and yanked all the wires and cords. I’m no techie, and I wasn’t proud of my primitive technique. I figured at the least the cords served her Internet.

The computer tower sat there grinning at me, daring me to figure how to eliminate it. I tore the wires from the back and then scanned the room for a disposal. Nothing. I opened the back door. The big oak tree sat there just asking for it. I took the computer tower covered with dust and chicken feathers and ran to the tree. There was a hollow at the top. I dropped it into the hole not wanting to completely trash the records it contained. It fell with a scratchy crash. The FBI could retrieve the info from the hard drive. I’d tell them where to find it… if I survived.

Somewhere in my peripheral hearing Tinkerbelle was barking her ear-piercing Maltese melody. By the rapidity of her yelps, I figured the chicken woman – compliance officer – was returning. I grabbed her keyboard in the hope of creating an illusion of theft. At a distance, she might assume I’d run off with the entire computer system and not think of looking in the hollow tree.

I galloped down the beach, the keyboard in one hand and Tinkerbelle in the other.

All three hundred pounds of the banker lady raced after me, screaming in a language I’m glad I didn’t understand. She was a mass of panting flesh with one bleeding earlobe. Two large chickens trotted behind her kicking sand in the air.

As a diversion, I threw the keyboard into the sea as hard and far as I could manage. Ms. Jean Luc stopped running, looked at me, then the ocean, and collapsed on the shore. Motionless, she looked like a huge beach rock.

My knee ached, and I had deep dog scratches on my belly as I reached the tender. Holding Tink by her collar, I jumped into the boat, dug the one-hundred dollar bill from my shoe and waggled it at the dock boy. He raced toward me, grabbed the money and untied the
Nibs.
We were off. Mission accomplished… I hoped.

Chapter Fifty-Two

As I swung around the stern of the
Predator
I could see the giant manta ray still stuck in the anchor chain. I slowed the boat and scoped out the action straining to see. Roger stood on the helideck next to the chopper. It appeared Kit was sitting inside the helicopter. Armed crewmen stood around the deck like a pack of edgy seabirds.

Before climbing from the tender to the swim platform, I made an executive decision. Turning the boat out to sea, I set the motor to fast-forward, grabbed Tink and jumped onto the swim platform. Then I scrambled to the mini-sub in the dry dock rails, pulled the key from the ignition and pitched it into the sea. Darlin’s Dudes had the chopper for our get away. The crew would be left with no way to follow us.

Inching up to the flight deck, I stood behind the landing screen, an eight-foot by ten-foot monitor that allowed the captain to observe the chopper’s takeoffs and landings. Roger looked my way and nodded. I hoped he meant for me to walk to him. With all the moxie I could muster, I strode out on the deck clutching the wiggling dog.

Roger leaned in and whispered. “Where’s the tender?”

“I cast it adrift.”

“You’re pretty smart. I like that in a woman.” His smile tingled in my pocket. “Follow my lead.”

Dale approached carrying a rifle in one hand and a revolver in the other. He was all attitude. “Where are the black market guys?”

“Wendy says they insist on coming by chopper. You stay here with the treasure and make sure the crew keeps their hands off it. We’ll go pick up the buyers.”

“If you’re double-crossing us…”

Roger stood his ground looking up at Dale. “You’re holding all the cards. You have the treasure in the van in the ship’s hold. You have the
Predator
. You cut the deal without me if you think you can do it. I told you, I’m their inside man. They trust me; they don’t know you. But go ahead. Try it your way. See how far you get.”

Dale shrugged. “Do what you need to do. This has taken long enough. The crew’s relieved Hook is out of the picture. They’ll be cool. See you before sunset?”

Roger nodded. We ran to the chopper and climbed in. Kit was in the back. I handed him Tinkerbelle. She snuggled in his lap looking pleased, despite the excitement crackling around her. Taking a quick inventory, I could see the suitcase, which I hoped contained the
Lost Boys.

Jaxbee was slumped in the middle front passenger seat, head back and earphones in place.

“Get in the pilot’s seat,” Roger said as he buckled into the third front seat.

“I can’t fly this thing. I can’t fly, period. I crashed a plane once.”

“Haven’t we all? Just do it. Jax is in no condition to fly the chopper. Her shoulder is dislocated and her right leg is broken. She hit the swim platform hard when Roscoe threw her.”

Chapter Fifty-Three

Taking hold of my fried nerves, I repeated… “Nothing is impossible. I’m possible.”

Jaxbee mumbled, “Remember your lessons. You can fly. I’ll walk you through it. I’m conscious… just dizzy from the pain. Wendy,… my father’s dead.”

“I know, Jax. I’m so sorry.”

“Roscoe and Croc, too.”

“Sweetie, I know. Just take it easy.” I turned to Roger. “What about the crew? Won’t they shoot us down?”

“As long as they think Jaxbee is at the controls and we’re headed to pick up the money men, they’ll let us leave. If Dale starts to sense something’s wrong we could be target practice. Let’s get out of gun range, fast.”

I tried to divorce myself from the tension. I needed to stay focused on what little I had learned during my play-lessons with Jaxbee. My fear of crashing lay just below the surface of my bravado. I wouldn’t let it overtake me.

“The poor manta ray’s horn is still stuck in the anchor chain. Those boys aren’t going anywhere,” Roger said as he looked out the chopper door.

Kit sat wide-eyed and silent, looking like a Ken doll after a kid’s soccer team had gotten hold of it. His face was bruised and his hair was a disaster.

I did as Jaxbee told me, repeating her instructions like a prayer.

I turned the starter key and the engine coughed to life.

“Today we’re gonna break some rules, if we hope to get away in one piece,” Jaxbee said.

“Don’t wait for the engine to warm up. As soon as your manifold pressure stabilizes around 3200 rpm, engage the rotor.” Her voice was shaky.

Giving her my scared silly look, I took one last breath and did as she instructed.

Slowly but deliberately turning the throttle, I watched the needle climb. Pulling hard on the engagement lever, the heavy blades of the
Shark
began to move – swish, swish, swish – making the most beautiful noise I’d ever heard, slowly picking up speed till it created enough downdraught to make the crew run for cover.

The noise inside the cockpit made normal conversation impossible. Jaxbee’s instructions crackled in my earphones, “Don’t look at any other instruments. Just glance at your manifold pressure, control it with your throttle, and whatever else you do, NEVER let it go below 3200 rpm. Okay. You’re good to go… NOW!”

I lost my stomach but kept some of my faculties. To avoid hitting the superstructure of the yacht, I maneuvered an awkward sideways takeoff. My hand trembled as I pulled on the collective, increasing throttle at the same time applying gentle pressure on the left pedal to keep the tail end from swinging around. The chopper rose shakily and stayed within ground effect for a moment while I wrestled with working four controls at once.

“Okay, steady as she goes… pull, pull, more collective…keep your cyclic neutral… more left pedal,” Jaxbee said.

We somehow broke the shackles of gravity and were now ten feet off the platform.

“Slowly on the stick to the left and forward slightly and feel your airspeed with your fanny as you take her through transition. Rather over rev than under rev,” she said.

At about thirty feet in the air we slowly drifted over the water. My sweating right hand pushed too hard on the stick for a brief moment. “Oh shit!” It came back to bite me. The tail lifted and the nose dipped to the water below. I over-corrected for the mistake. The nose lifted and the tail dipped. A flash of panic hit me. I beat it back. Jaxbee couldn’t help me. I had to get the feel for the chopper on my own. I was the loneliest person on the planet. It was just the machine and me.

Everything then happened in slow motion, as if God himself came to the rescue and retarded time in order to give me the opportunity to recover. The
Shark
was level. The front of the chopper was like half a fishbowl with glass nearly reaching under our feet. Through the bottom dome I could see the ocean picking up speed. We were good.

Jaxbee scanned the instruments and counted the airspeed on the intercom. “20, 30, 50, 60 – up and away.”

I leaned back on the stick to pull the
Shark
into a steep climb to an altitude of 300 feet. Heavenly elation overtook my being as I realized I was in control of this incredible bronco.

Now all I had to do was land the bloody thing at Saint Kitts. I looked out over the crystal clear water and watched sharks circling the yacht waiting for the giant manta ray to die.

Jax started to speak, “In case something happens to me –”

I almost jumped out of my skin. “Stop! Don’t say it. Never again.”

Roger reached over and squeezed my arm. “You’re doing fine. We’ll call the feds to get the crew when we land. Were you able to stop the wire transfers?”

“Think so.”

“Do you have the backup for Hook’s accounts?”

“Think so.”

He squinted his eyes at me.

“Tell you later,” I said as I concentrated on flying the Wendy-Bird.

Saint Kitts airport came into view. Jaxbee threw a few more pointers in my direction.

The sun slipped behind a cloud as the chopper wobbled onto the airport tarmac, its tail dancing like an angry cat. The blades slowed to a halt. I fell apart. Tears of relief flooded my eyes. It was the first time I’d failed to keep a promise, but I felt good about not taking care of Hook.

“Hey!” Roger reached over and hugged me. It was a warm, stinky embrace. “We make quite a team. How about we go after the thirteenth
Lost Boy
?”

“You have the worst timing in the world.” I slipped out of his embrace. “Will you please ditch those brown shoes?”

“I didn’t hear my name mentioned,” said Kit, the color returning to his face.

“Would you like to join us in recovering the thirteenth
Lost Boy
?” Roger asked.

“You bet your tushie … no.”

Chapter Fifty-Four

The
Shark
was on the ground, but my legs were still up in the air. I checked my watch. Could it be only four in the afternoon? It seemed like a lifetime.

Roger, Kit, Jaxbee, and I sat on the small porch of the Saint Kitts airport, with the dull drone of cable news on the monitors inside the building. We sipped on paper cups of water. Without a penny in our pockets we were hungry panhandlers drinking free tap water.

“How soon will we be in Miami?” Jaxbee was groggy. The local medicine man had given her a Darvocet to ease the pain in her shoulder.

“My client’s private jet will be here in a few hours. We’ll have you home before midnight.” Although Kit and Jaxbee now were in the loop about the
Lost Boys
, they were still loopy. Roger was up to speed on what had transpired at the chicken bank.

“You did well,” he said to me as he hunched forward studying my expression.

“You know I need to go back to Nevisland? I have to find Peter.”

His brows came together in a frown. “Don’t go back. Do you understand I care about you?”

I took my time choosing my words carefully. “Do you understand I
can’t
care about you until I know how I feel about Peter? I have to go back before I can go forward.”

“I understand.” He leaned his head on the porch post. “You do know he’s a crook?”

“I doubt that, but it’s something I have to discover for myself. He’s two miles away after twenty years… he’s two friggin’ miles away. I’m going. I haven’t come this far to walk away without an answer.”

He crushed his paper cup and balled it up in his hand. “Hook’s world is about to fall apart. I set the FBI wheels in motion with my call. They’ll be on the
Predator
within the hour and then onto Nevis and the bank. You could get caught up in red tape or even gunfire.”