Wiley was not satisfied. Like an ungainly baseball pitcher, he wound up and hurled the survey stake end-over-end into the trees.
The missile was answered by an odd strangled peep.
Wiley chuckled. “Just as I thought,” he said, “a wood stork.”
Just then the thicket ruptured with an explosion so enormous that Kara Lynn was certain that Wiley had accidentally detonated the dynamite.
When she opened her eyes, he was sitting down, slack-jawed and pale. The red kerchief was askew, drooped over one eye. Both legs stuck straight out, doll-like, in front of him. He seemed transfixed by something close at hand—a radiant splotch of crimson and a yellow knob of bone, where his right knee used to be. Absently he fingered the frayed hole in his trousers.
Kara Lynn felt a surge of nausea. She gulped a breath.
Brian Keyes moved quickly out of the trees.
His brown hair was plastered to his forehead; rain streamed down his cheeks. His face was blank. He was walking deliberately, a little hurried, as if his flight were boarding.
He strode up to Skip Wiley, placed a foot on his chest, and kicked him flat on his back. A regular one-man cavalry! Kara Lynn was elated, washed with relief. She didn’t notice the Browning in Brian’s right hand until he shoved the barrel into Wiley’s mouth.
‘“Hello, Skip,” Keyes said. “How about telling me where you anchored the boat?”
Wiley’s wolfish eyes crinkled with amusement. He grunted an indecipherable greeting. Keyes slowly withdrew the gun, but kept it inches from Wiley’s nose.
“Holy Christ!” Wiley boomed, sitting up. “And I thought you were dangerous with a typewriter.”
“You’re losing blood,” Keyes said.
“No thanks to you.”
“Where’s the boat?”
“Not so fast.”
Keyes fired again, the gun so close to Wiley’s face that the charge knocked him back down. Wiley clutched at his ears and rolled away, over the sharp corrugated coral. The bullet had thwacked harmlessly into the stucco rubble of the old cabin.
Kara Lynn cried out involuntarily—she was afraid she’d have to watch a killing. Keyes came over, untied her, and gave a gentle hug. “You okay?”
She nodded. “I want to get out of here. They’re going to dynamite this place—”
“I know.” He had to find Wiley’s boat.
Joey the shrimper had been generous enough to provide a tin of smoked amberjack and a jug of water before letting them off, but he had not been generous enough to wait around. Muttering about the obscene cost of fuel, he had aimed the Tina Marie away from the island, leaving his passengers to find their own way back to the mainland.
Keyes stood over Wiley and ordered him to sit up.
“You’re in an ugly mood,” Wiley said nervously. His ears rang. He felt like he was talking down a tunnel.
Keyes took off his shirt and tied it around Wiley’s mutilated leg. ‘We haven’t got much time,” he said.
Wiley studied Brian intently; the gun made him a stranger. The violent eruption was unnerving enough, but what sobered Wiley even more was the look of chilling and absolute indifference. This was not the same polite young man who’d sat next to him in the newsroom; Wiley feared a loss of leverage. Against this Brian Keyes, in this place, Wiley’s weapons were greatly limited. Right away he ruled out charm, wit, and oratory.
“How’d you find me?”
“Never mind,” Keyes said.
“Jenna told you, right?”
“No.” So she had known. Of course she knew. “Give me the keys to the Mako,” Keyes said.
Grudgingly Wiley handed them over.
He pointed at Kara Lynn. “It’s the girl, isn’t it? You fell for her! That’s why you’re in Charlie Bronson mode—defending the fair maiden. Just your luck, Brian. Seems like I’m always screwing up your love life.”
Keyes didn’t know how much longer he could hold up. He wanted to go now, while he still had the strength, while he was still propelled by whatever it was that let him pull the trigger one more time.
“Kara Lynn, would you like to know a secret about Mr. Keyes?”
She said nothing, knowing that it wasn’t finished yet. Not as long as Wiley could speak.