Page 14 of Passion's Wicked Torment

“Ahoy! Ahoy on board!” The voice came from a bull horn. The chugga-chugga sounds of the cutter’s big engines could be heard in the background as the boat pulled up alongside the Paradise. The siren died away slowly with a fading whine. “This is the Coast Guard. Request permission to come aboard.”

“Denied!” The captain of the Paradise was speaking through a bull horn too. “Permission denied! You know what sort of ship this is, Ensign. We don’t want you aboard. And we’re out here beyond the three-mile limit.”

“We saw a distress flare. What is your situation?” Hunter opened the door again and looked out. He spoke to Kristin in a whisper as he peered at the nighttime scene, which was now brightly lit up near the forward deck by searchlights from the Coast Guard cutter. “Get ready, babe. When I say the word, we go. We’ll move back to the aft motor skiff. It’s already on the water, ready to take the Johns back later. We’ll try to get into it without being seen.”

“Can’t we just go straight to the Coast Guard now? Just saunter right on over to them? These hoods wouldn’t shoot us or try to stop us with the Coast Guard watching.”

“Don’t be so sure. They don’t want trouble with the feds, you’re right. But if you get to the Coast Guard and tell them about being abducted, they’ll have trouble anyway. That falls under the international piracy laws, and there’s no three-mile limit on that. Rooney’s thugs may try to stop you, even if they have to fire on the Coast Guard to do it.”

That Sounded unlikely to Kristin. Hunter noticed this and shrugged. “Maybe it is safer than the alternative. You might want to try it. I can’t go with you though.” “Why not?”

“I’m wanted on a half-dozen federal warrants. Once they got me, they’d never let go.” He paused. “But you go ahead, if you want to.”

“No,” she said. “I’ll stay with you.” She almost surprised herself by saying this. She told herself that she had a good reason for taking this course of action: She needed to stay near Hunter for Chad’s sake. Deep down, though, she knew there was another reason making her choose to take her chances alongside Dallas Hunter.

“This is it. Let’s go.” He took her hand and pulled her after him. They scurried down the deck, toward the rear, keeping low. A spotlight beam passed over their heads but did not catch them. All attention on the ship was focused on the scene taking place near the helm, where the Paradise captain was insisting that the flare was set off accidentally, while the Coast Guard ensign commanding the cutter was equally insistent that he should be allowed to come aboard to check out the situation for himself.

As Hunter and Kristin neared the skiff at the rear, near the side of the ship away from the Coast Guard, they came face to face with one of the hoods, Bill Bonebrake, who was standing there ready for action.

“Hey! Who the hell are you?” The barrel of Bone-brake’s Tommy pivoted toward Hunter’s chest before Hunter had a chance to react. The hood stared at him, his face grim with suspicion. Suddenly his face brightened though. “Oh, it’s only you, Casanova. So, how’s your love life?” Everyone on the ship had heard the story of how the hick in the bow tie had brought a bouquet of flowers, like a school kid on his first date. The hood lowered his Tommy nonchalantly.

Then his eyes fell on Kristin, who came up behind Hunter. Realization dawned on his face. Looking back at Hunter, the hood now noticed the pistol held down at his side. Bonebrake tried to raise his Tommy again. Hunter slugged him hard, sending him crashing backward. He leaped at him before he could recover his balance, and he hit him again, even harder. Hunter yanked him down to the deck and pulled him around the corner of the cabin, just as a voice barked over the bull horn from the Coast Guard cutter. “What was that noise? Let’s have some illumination over there, Seaman.”

The searchlight beam swung over to the aft section. Hunter and the unconscious hood were out of sight, but Kristin had not had time to move around the corner. She was caught in the bright beam, squinting into it, wearing only her blue bathrobe. What could she do? She felt the tension sharply increase on the deck of the Paradise, and she heard the gasps from several crewmen. She could sense their fingers secretly tightening on hidden weapon triggers. Her own gun was out of sight, in the hand held behind her.

She smiled and waved at the Coast Guard ensign. She could not see his reaction because she was blinded by the searchlight, but evidently her ploy worked. The beam swung away, the ensign satisfied that nothing suspicious had taken place. He returned to his argument with the captain of the Paradise. Kristin saw several members of the crew begin sauntering down the deck toward her with seeming nonchalance.

Hunter’s hand grabbed her and pulled her around the corner. There was a metal ladder near him, leading down to the skiff in the water. He practically shoved her down it, nearly making her fall. She got into the bottom of the small skiff. Hunter joined her and quickly cast off the line. He did not dare start the engine. The Coast Guard would hear and come to investigate. There were oars in the boat. He handed his gun to Kristin, then quickly began rowing away from the Paradise.

Two crewmen reached the ladder now and saw what was happening. One raised a pistol to shoot, but the other slapped his arm aside sharply. A shot right now was all they needed! He cursed the man’s stupidity in a low voice. Then he demonstrated his own stupidity by pulling off his sweater and diving into the water, whereupon he began swimming toward the rapidly departing skiff. He was a good swimmer, and he reached the skiff just in time for Hunter to slam him on the head with the flat of an oar, knocking him under the water. If he surfaced, Kristin did not see him do it.

The Coast Guard cutter’s engines came loudly to life as the white ship began to depart. The argument had ended. The ensign had been continuing it this long only for harassment purposes anyway. He knew he could not board the ship without more of a provocation than he had. Kristin could not see the ship departing at first, since it was on the other side of the Paradise. After a minute it came into view, slicing through the water back toward the cluster of pinpoint lights on the mainland, leaving a phosphorescent blue foam is its wake.

Now Hunter pulled the cord on the outboard, bringing the motor to life. “Get down low,” he ordered as he took the rudder and moved perpendicularly away from the Paradise as fast as he could travel. “There’s nothing stopping them now.”

Shots rang out from aboard the ship. Kristin saw water splash up very near them on both sides of their small craft. One bullet careened into the skiff near where Kristin lay on the floor, blowing a hole the size of a dime in the wooden side.

The engines on the Paradise began turning over. It seemed to Kristin that the Paradise would almost certainly be swifter than a mere water taxi, but also that it would take a while for engines that size to warm up before the ship could reach full speed and overtake them.

She turned to Hunter, the cool sea wind whipping through her hair as the skiff sped forward. “Will we be able to reach the mainland before they catch us?” she shouted above the roar of the motor.

“No problem!” shouted Hunter.

Another burst of Tommy-gun fire came from the Paradise, and this time, instead of splashing the water alongside, it stitched a line of bullet holes along the side and bottom of the skiff.

“Problem,” corrected Hunter. Sea water began to spout in jets into the bottom of the boat. He looked toward the front of the skiff, at the utility cabinet. “See if there’s a bucket or anything to bail with.”

She hurried to the cabinet, keeping half-crouched to avoid falling over in the choppy sea. “Nothing! Not even a teacup!”

The Paradise was after them now, slicing through the water, its engines churning up the sea. It was still far enough back so that they had time before it reached full speed, but it was gaining on them. Kristin could imagine the horrified faces of the Johns on board, ordinary workingmen out for a good time, who had never expected to witness a shootout at sea. On second thought, she realized, they were probably all being kept below decks so they could no

t see what was happening. That way they could not be witnesses.

Hunter glanced at the water that ceaselessly jetted into the boat, now covering the bottom completely. His eyes were squinting against the wind. “We won’t make it to the mainland. I’m heading us out to Ana Pris Island. It’s only a mile from here—farther out, not closer in.”

“Are there people on it?” she had to shout quite loudly to be heard above the roar of the loud motor.

“Yeah. But no one who’ll jump at the chance to help us. It’s a transfer point for bootleg booze coming in from Europe. One group of hoods drops the stuff off; another comes to pick it up in smaller boats and run it into the mainland.”

“Are any of your men involved?”

“I’m a Chicago boy, remember? This is strictly a New York crowd.” More bullets churned the water near them. “Stay low, babe. Don’t want to lose you.” They sped through the water in silence. Kristin was preoccupied with wondering how much longer she would live. The signs were not very fortuitous. She felt the cold wind on her face, making her nose and ears numb. The stars and the moon danced above, looking exceptionally bright. Behind them was the Paradise, still a good distance away. The distance did not matter, though, for their skiff was rapidly filling with water, slowing its progress. If they did not reach Ana Pris soon, they would find themselves under water.

“There!” shouted Hunter, pointing. She saw it looming up before them, silhouetted against the starry sky. It was jagged and mountainous, with a forest of tall trees blanketing the base. Hunter did not head straight for the nearest point, but instead motored parallel to the coast for a few minutes. “The beach was too flat and empty back there,” he explained. “Over here there’s more cover. Trees, cliffs, nooks and crannies. More places to hide.”

He aimed the skiff toward the rocky beach. It was not a moment too soon. The skiff was on the verge of sinking. “Hold tight!” He rammed it onto the beach, hitting a jagged rock that sent Kristin pitching forward in the boat. She fell down into the cold water in the bottom, losing the guns she had been holding. She began searching for them frantically, but Hunter pulled her up and grasped her hand. Then, the next thing she knew, they were running with all their might between the jagged rocks along the sandy beach. Gunfire was crackling behind them, and bullets were zinging into the rocks and the sand on all sides.

A line of trees loomed up in the distance ahead of them, and soon they were into it, leaving the gunfire behind. Hunter pulled her along as he ran, leading the way. Soon Kristin was out of breath and panting, her lungs burning, her legs aching. Still he kept pulling her forward. She said nothing, determined not to complain. When it seemed she could not run any farther, he bent down and lifted her into his arms. She put her arms around his neck. Then he continued running with her.

It was only after they reached higher ground, where they could see the beach and offshore water below through the break in the tree line, that Hunter set her down and gave himself a moment to catch his breath. He collapsed to the forest floor and sat resting with his back against a tree. Together they watched the Paradise pull close to the coastline, but not so close as to endanger scraping her keel along the shallow ocean bottom. Kristin thought that the second skiff would already have been put out, with hoods aboard to bring them back. But as it turned out, the second skiff was still on board.

“What are they waiting for?” Kristin asked.

“They’re deciding whether it’s worth it to come after us. They’ve already spared off half their future business from all this gunfire. They don’t want to drag this out any longer than necessary.”

“You think they’ll leave us alone, then?” she asked hopefully.

His eyes were riveted on the Paradise, which was idling just off the coast. “It’s fifty-fifty either way. They’ll catch hell from Rooney if they let you escape. He’s a powerful man. They don’t want to anger him.”

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