Pilot Error (13 page)

Lightning.

It forked toward the ground as she watched, as if her terror of it had conjured it up, slicing the dark clouds to the southeast like a laser knife. Terrified, Micki scrambled backwards in the sand, forgetting her rescue plans as quickly as she had forgotten about being wet, uncomfortable, and abandoned. She counted off the seconds until the thunder came, trying to estimate the storm's proximity.

She got to fifteen before the low rumble stopped her. That meant the brunt of it was still several miles away, but her concern was for the lightning. There was serious lightning in those clouds; lightning that could kill from miles away. She could not survive on this godforsaken dot of sand—not without the boat and Luke.

Taking deep breaths that were meant to calm her, Micki vehemently corrected herself. She couldn't survive without the boat; Hardigan could be shark bait for all she cared. Actually, that idea sounded pretty good right now.

So why was she still waiting there like a faithful idiot, shivering in her wet clothes and peering out across a gray ocean that showed no sign of his return?

Because you believed him, Micki—you dolt—and the worst thing is, part of you still does.

"Damn it," she said aloud. Fueled by contempt, she turned her back on the storm and concentrated on survival. She had to set up the ELT while she still could. Several feet of the beach on which she knelt had already disappeared under the swelling tide, and the breeze had started to blow significantly stronger against her damp clothes.

Carefully extracting the old orange-colored transmitter from her backpack, Micki stood and carried it up toward the scrub, where she hoped it would be safe from the coming storm surge. Trouble was, if she got too close, then the mangrove trees would distort the signal, so she settled for some dry, open sand about fifteen feet from the trees. A few stacked rocks and a piece of driftwood kept the unit and its antenna vertical, hopefully throughout the duration of the coming tempest. With a flick of the switch that would bring deliverance, Micki stood back and watched the red indicator light blink in a steady rhythm.

The storm made its presence known at her back, and she struggled to overcome the instant terror it brought. The truth was, no one would be out looking for her in the middle of a raging thunderstorm; not Tex, not Padre, not Tim, or even Dirk. But if it just held off long enough, if they just started to look for her, then they might hear the signal before they were forced to return to Marathon.

And that was a chance she had to take. It felt like her only chance. Fizz came up beside her, and Micki combed her fingers through his salt-matted, black and white fur. "And if they don't come looking for us tonight, boy? What then?"

Fizz whined.

Rescue or not, by morning the ELT's battery would be dead, as she might be if she didn't find some shelter. Leaving one final clue to her would-be rescuers, Micki took off her Coast Guard cap and wedged it between the transmitter and the piece of driftwood. Then she picked herself up, reclaimed her backpack, and headed determinedly toward the peninsula that jutted into the waves. The rocks there might provide some meager form of protection, either a ledge high enough to crawl under or a ditch low enough to lie down in.

The unwanted memory of lying in a ditch with Luke made her draw a sharp breath. The recollection of how his body felt beneath her, damp and warm and hard—

As she stepped off the loose sand and onto the rocks, she stubbed her bare toe on a crag and almost tripped. Grunting, Micki forced herself to concentrate on survival, not Luke Hardigan, even if, for reasons she could not explain, the two still somehow seemed synonymous.

Coming to a stop, Micki raised her hand to her eyes and gazed out to sea. The wondrous and unexpected sight of a tiny boat bobbing on the vast expanse of gray, turbulent water filled her with a rush of exhilaration.

Rescue!

She was just drawing a breath to call out when she realized the boat was empty. It hit like a splash of cold water on the heat of her euphoria, causing her shout to die unsaid. The battered aluminum craft before her was their commandeered jon boat. With that knowledge, her surroundings suddenly became clear, too; she was on the island marking the helo crash site. More precisely, she was standing on the J-shaped peninsula. So, Luke had told her the truth. He hadn't abandoned her after all.

Micki frowned. Oh yes, he had.

The jon boat was obviously empty, and there was no sign of anybody in the water, even though Luke had said he was going to dive on the helo. Since he couldn't have concealed air tanks in that catch-all camera bag of his, he would have to come up to breathe sometime. Then she would—

Then she would what? Yell for him to come back and get her? That had worked real well before. The jerk. He had still rowed off and left her to think she was stranded. Just because he told the truth about diving on the helo didn't mean he would keep his promise to return for her. Maybe she should just swim out to the boat and 'commandeer' it for herself.

That idea was dismissed the moment it was formed. The jon boat was out a fair way, and she was already tired. Without the life vests, which had been left in the ditch where she and Luke had hidden to avoid detection, Micki wasn't sure she could make it.

The sight of Luke's dark head bobbing to the surface, just as thunder rumbled again, made her catch her lip between her teeth. He was still out there. He hadn't drowned after all.

The thought made her angry, and relieved, but she refused to dwell on the implications. Okay, so she was glad he wasn't dead. That was no big deal. It just meant that maybe she wouldn't have to swim out to the stupid boat in heavy seas after all.

Luke's head disappeared again, drawing a snort of frustration from her. What was he doing out there, anyway? And how much longer was he going to play this insane game?

Thunder growled, not too many miles behind her. The storm was maybe half an hour off, and the odds of being rescued before it broke dropped steadily with each passing minute.

If only you'd just come back, Luke!

As if in answer, she saw him surface again, this time to haul himself back into the boat. His form disappeared from sight for a moment, as if he had collapsed in exhaustion, and Micki held her breath to see what he would do next. After a moment, he struggled upright then moved to the bow to pull in the anchor.

Stubbornly, she bit down on her joy as he started rowing directly toward her. So he was coming back. Big deal.

Micki moved off the rocks and back onto the sand. There, arms folded across her chest and bare feet firmly planted in the ground coral, she watched his slow, labored progress across the whitecaps. If he thought that she was waiting for him with welcoming arms, then he could damn well think again.

***

Standing on a little-used dock down on 62nd Street Gulf, Dirk Jurgensen fought to light a cigarette in the strengthening gale. Looking up, he pulled it from his lips and exhaled with narrowing eyes, watching the red-hulled speedboat coming across the choppy waters of the Gulf. As he waited for it to draw closer, he cast a thoughtful glance at the storm, and then another worried one at his watch.

Dinner date or not, Micki should have been in by now; it wasn't like her to be out flying when a line of storms of this magnitude was imminent. When he had checked her hangar, just minutes before going down to the dock, her plane had still been out. She had left before 9:00am, so she should have been back from her scenic flight with Hardigan by 10:00am. It was now nearing 5:00pm, and the Cessna only carried enough fuel to remain aloft for four hours. True, she could have come in and refueled when he wasn't there—and he had been busy that day—but that still didn't explain why she wasn't back now. Even if she flew in this second, she would have to deal with landing in a pretty mean crosswind.

The lightning sizzled at his back, so fierce it made him turn. Dirk squinted defiantly into the face of the squall. Micki was terrified of lightning. Nowadays, a vicious lightning storm was the only time she ever allowed him to get up close and personal, the only time he got to hold her in his arms.

Where the hell was she?

Dirk scowled. Personal pleasures aside, the last thing he needed was to waste time looking for her. Thanks to the helo crash, he had enough to do with supervising the complete relocation of the business and stock. Razor's death was becoming a pain in the butt, especially this close to Dirk's planned 'retirement.' They were headed to Bermuda, and the cargo plane that his boss, Dominic Van Allen, was sending was due in Marathon within the hour. Dirk planned to depart the Florida Keys by 7:00pm, but now it looked like he was going to miss that deadline; a thought that only added to his dour mood. Ever since Luke Hardigan showed up, the entire universe had conspired against his carefully laid plans.

Hardigan. Micki was with him, and the notion—however implausible—of her taking refuge from the lightning in
his
arms made Dirk bristle with jealousy.

The red-hulled speedboat slowed as it drew closer under the overcast sky. Taking another drag on his cigarette as he turned, Dirk released the smoke in a controlled stream through his teeth. Three of the men onboard scurried like worker ants as they readied the craft for docking, while a fourth short, dumpy, blond one stood lazily aft. He instantly recognized the slacker as Reynolds. The man was leaning on a rough wooden crate, his AK-47 assault rifle in full view on the cream vinyl seat.

Dirk frowned, and exhaled another lungful of smoke that was instantly lost in a twenty knot gust. He had never liked Reynolds; the guy was a common street thug. It was only because he had been sent to the Keys with him by their mutual employer that Reynolds remained on the payroll. At least Dirk had been put in charge of the operation. Although he was not actually within range to see it, he could just imagine Reynolds' lips twitching into an antagonistic smile, because on cue, the short little man leisurely picked up a jacket to throw over the gun.

The boat nosed gently into the dock. The guy manning the helm cut the engine, while another jumped out to secure a line. Dirk flicked his half-smoked cigarette into the canal.

"I want all these loaded into the truck pronto," Dirk said indicating the crates that weighted the red hull down past its normal waterline. The three crewmen, and the two men standing behind Dirk near a rental truck, moved to obey.

Reynolds picked up the jacket and the weapon underneath, and disembarked. Handing the gun to the nearest man, he hooked his finger through the loop at the jacket's collar and flung it casually over his shoulder as he walked up the dock.

"This is the last," he reported upon reaching Dirk. "The place is clean."

"Good. I want this stuff taken back to the hangar and stored with the rest until our ride gets here."

"When's that?"

"Within the hour. Then I want the plane loaded, refueled, and ready to go by seven. Got it?"

Reynolds eyed him contemptuously. "What are you gonna do while the rest of us slave?"

"Just do it."

Sneering resentfully, Reynolds gave him a mock salute. "Aye aye,
Mon Capitan
."

It was then, as the little man moved past him, that the leather jacket caught Dirk's eye. Recognition, sure and terrible, swept through him, and he reached for Reynolds impulsively. Spinning him around, Dirk seized him by the front of his shirt.

"Where did you get that jacket?"

The stunned look on Reynolds' face quickly changed to one of confusion. When he took longer than two seconds to answer, Dirk bodily hauled him backwards and slammed him against the side of the yellow rental truck. The noise caused the men to stop working for a moment, but Dirk ignored them all.

"Where?" he growled in a dangerously low voice.

"I-I found it."

Letting him go, Dirk snatched the black jacket from the other man's grasp. He turned the material over until he found the scuffed leather on the right shoulder that had first attracted his attention. He had noticed this same abrasion last night, at
The Sandpiper.

"This is Micki's jacket."

"I—"

"Where did you get it? Where is she, Reynolds? What have you done to her?"

Reynolds recovered enough of his nerve to push Dirk out of his face. "Lay off, Jurgensen, I haven't seen your girlfriend. Not unless..." His glance flicked to the jacket, and slowly he began to smile.

It wasn't an expression that Dirk liked, and he reluctantly pressed for answers. "Unless what?"

Reynolds pushed himself away from the truck and put two steps between them before saying more. When he finally answered, it seemed he was ignoring the question, though his smile seemed to indicate otherwise.

"By the way, you were right earlier about us having company." Reynolds smirked, visibly gaining courage by the moment—perhaps because he knew exactly how hard the news was hitting Dirk. "But we took care of it."

"What the hell did you do?"

"We went Cessna hunting. With the AKs, it wasn't that hard." Reynolds grinned venomously. "Bagged ourselves a beaut, too. Sorry, I didn't know your old lady was onboard."

Dirk's eyes widened in horror. "I told you to hide the merchandise so it couldn't be seen from the air! Not shoot her down!" This time he dropped the jacket and grabbed the little man by the throat. "I'm gonna kill you, you fat bastard."