Page 126 of Still See You Everywhere

“I had nothing to do with that. Lea arranged it. Did some research on the corrections officers at Keahi’s facility. Found one with ties to Hawaii and a crushing load of overdue child support. Leilani offered him cash to get her sister out and all the way to Honolulu, though it sounds like Keahi added some incentive of her own.” I can already tell Brent is smiling. “Keahi met us at the airport this morning—”

“Just like that?”

“Hey, 100K buys good help.”

“And the CO? Did he personally deliver her?”

“Never saw him.”

“Gee, wonder why…”

I let my voice trail off. If Brent caught the dangerous innuendo, he doesn’t seem to care. “Hey, I just helped smuggle Keahi onto the Cessna. Not so hard to do. Once the food was loaded, not like anyone’s paying attention to a private charter. I walked her out looking like another passenger, then at the last second, slipped her into the back. Lea kept MacManus and his people distracted. And then we hit the skies.”

This does not make me think highly of airport security. Though again, given my own experience accessing a private charter, there really isn’t any.

“What happens at the end of all this?” I ask curiously. “We’re all dead, I’m assuming. You, Lea, and Keahi are the only ones left standing. You, what, somehow manage to kill a woman twenty times deadlier than a viper. Then you and Lea fly back to Honolulu? Make up some tale of woe, take over Mac’s operations—illegal and otherwise—and have two point two children and never speak of this again?”

“Where are we going? You said they were in one of the cabins!” Brent digs his gun hard enough into my lower back to make me wince.

“They are! We’re going in the back way. Other end of the U. I’m assuming it’s our best option for approaching without being seen.”

“Oh.” He concedes my point as we step off the main artery onto a lesser-used dirt trail that snakes through overgrown bushes and densely packed palms. I’d learned of this secret passageway from Tannis when we made our escape after eavesdropping on MacManus’s conversation with Charlie. It is narrow and muddy, but connects with the barracks from the rear, arriving at Vaughn’s cabin first.

We veer around a corner. I come to an abrupt halt, Brent nearly colliding into me. A giant sapphire-blue coconut crab blocks the trail in front of us. I pin my light on it. It takes a menacing step forward.

“Step over it,” Brent commands.

“You step over it. That thing’s huge. Did you know the claws work like hydraulics?”

“Shut up!”

I fall silent, waving my flashlight at the beast, trying to tempt it into moving. It hunkers down in full blockade stance. Ronin had said they were territorial.

“Just give it a second,” I say at last. I don’t know what else to do. We need the crab to move. We need to reach the end of this trail. I need us to come out the other side. My heart is pounding too hard in my chest, my eyes beginning to sting with tears. And now is not the time. I can’t afford to lose it.

What had Vaughn said just hours before on the runway? Whatever it is, let it go. You can deal with it later.

Whatever the damage.

Whatever the horror.

Whatever the cost to your soul.

The crab finally shifts. One last fierce look, then it lumbers off into the underbrush. I force myself to move forward, eyeing its exit path warily.

In a matter of moments, this muddy little trail will connect with the main path. Brent will recognize immediately where we are. The question is, what will he do then? Once he can guess our destination, he won’t need me anymore.

“Shhh,” I murmur to him now. “We need to slow down, move quietly, so we don’t alert them.”

“Where are we—Vaughn’s cabin. Of course Mac commandeered it. I’m surprised he didn’t bolt from the mess hall to his private lodge in the very beginning.”

“He wanted to. Couldn’t figure out how to get everyone there safely.” I turn slightly, peering over my shoulder. “MacManus didn’t abandon us. He’s been working with Vaughn trying to save us all.”

Based on the look on Brent’s face, my words are too little, too late. He’s had four years to judge MacManus for himself. Combined with the stories Leilani has been feeding him… He’s not doubting his target anytime soon.

This is it. The thick growth on either side of us ends. The cleared opening around Vaughn’s cabin begins.

No lights are on. It sits forty feet from us, situated out on the point. A darker shadow in the already dark night.

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