Michael Prescott - Deadly Pursuit

Then he was out of the harbor, riding the shallow bay. He turned south and throttled forward, increasing his speed to fifteen knots. Visualizing a chart of the area, he mentally plotted a course for Pelican Key.

Though there was no moon, the sky was clear, the stars shining with the hard brilliance of gems. Jack could distinguish the dark shape of Shell Key as he motored past. Ahead, the bridge over Tea Table Key Channel arched its long back like the mounted skeleton of a dinosaur. He nosed into the channel, leaving the bay for swifter waters.

As he guided the dinghy east, he reviewed and expanded on his plans. As far as he knew, Pelican Key was still uninhabited. He could stay there for weeks-months, if necessary-motoring to Upper or Lower Matecumbe Key occasionally to replenish his supplies.

There was a chance, of course, that old Donald Larson or his family actually had taken up residence on the island after all these years. In that case Jack would have to move on. The Keys covered a lot of territory. He could find someplace else to hide.

A more immediate worry was that Steve Gardner or some other friend from his high-school years would mention Pelican Key to the authorities. He found it unlikely that the police would pay much attention; roughing it overnight in the wild as a teenager was one thing, but surviving alone on a tropical island at the age of thirty-five, not for hours but for weeks, was something else.

Even so, some local cops might be sent over to nose around. Jack was confident that he knew Pelican Key well enough to stay out of their sight for however long they lingered there. The island offered many places of concealment. They would depart empty-handed and report a dead end.

When he finally left Pelican Key, perhaps in late September, the government heat would have died down somewhat, and he would have had time to cultivate a tan and a beard, grow his hair long, and bulk up his muscles with rigorous workouts. The alterations in his appearance should keep him safe from recognition.

In Islamorada he would board a bus to Miami. From there it was only a short hop to the Bahamas. Plenty of banking, finance, and investment activity in Nassau, much of it occupying the gray areas at the edges of the law. Many opportunities for scams.

A good life in other respects also, from what he’d heard. Casinos, powerboating, sportfishing, tennis in the tropical sun. Conch fritters and boiled grouper spiced with red-hot peppers and washed down with dark rum at a tiki-bar. Lithe brown girls who could be had for less than Sheila’s extravagant tastes had cost him-girls who were safe to flirt and consort with, because they were not at all his type.

And when he needed one of his type again, when the feelings became too strong to ignore…

Well, there were plenty of American, Canadian, and British women in the Bahamas, both tourists and residents, many of them fair-skinned, blue-eyed, and blond. They would be no more difficult to pick up on a Friday night than Ronni Tyler had been.

And the Bahamas-think of it-a chain of seven hundred islands, the majority uninhabited. There was no need for the bodies ever to be found.

Yes, a good life. And all he needed to make it happen was a permanent change of identity. That particular detail would be arranged in the coming month.

Jack opened the throttle another notch. The engine burred like a lawn mower. Spray measled his face, moistened his hair. He thought about Teddy Lunt.

Teddy Lunt was a chirpy little bald guy he had met in prison-another hustler like himself, only Lunt’s game was phony ID, a growth industry in California, with its proliferation of illegal immigrants. Not all of the illegals were impoverished campesinos; some had money, enough to pay for specialized services of the sort Teddy provided.

For five thousand dollars Lunt could supply anyone with a new identity-driver’s license, passport, Social Security card, birth certificate, the works-quality paper, backed up by official entries in government files. The hacker’s art of obtaining access to encrypted computer data was one of several skills Teddy had mastered.

Lunt was out now, relocated in San Diego, supposedly reformed. Jack knew his address. And he knew that con men were never reformed. They simply switched to subtler scams, such as his own precious metals swindle. Teddy was still in business. Jack was counting on that.

I’ll rent a post office box in Islamorada, he mused. Then send Teddy my driver’s license-he can use the photo for the new license and passport-along with whatever cash I can spare. Probably about twenty-five hundred. He’ll know I’m good for the rest.

Once Lunt sent the papers, Jack could travel to the Bahamas under his new name; no visa was required for U.S. citizens traveling as tourists. After establishing himself in some pseudo-legitimate enterprise, he would apply for a green card, or whatever they called it over there; if the bureaucracy gave him any hassles, perhaps Teddy could doctor up the requisite Bahamian papers as well.

It would work. It had to.

Jack maintained an easterly course, navigating by landmarks familiar from his boyhood: the lights of the Matecumbe Keys due west, the beacon of the Alligator Reef lighthouse to the south. From time to time he made small corrections to adjust for the gentle push of the southerly breeze. There was a natural inclination to steer away from a wind on the beam; he nudged the nose of the dinghy a few degrees starboard to compensate.

Dead ahead, the stars nearest the horizon began winking out, swallowed by a deeper darkness. The black, ragged line of Pelican Key resolved itself out of the gloom.

Jack relaxed, seeing it. “My private island,” he breathed.

He felt his mouth smile.

Wetness. Wetness on his hand.

Steve Gardner surfaced from sleep and felt a soft tongue licking his knuckles. Anastasia, whining softly.

“What is it, Ana?” he whispered. “You need to go outside?”

The dog sniffed the air and growled.

No, he realized. That’s not it. She’s worked up about something.

Apprehension slapped him fully awake. He listened to the house. Heard nothing but Kirstie’s soft, regular breathing and Ana’s warning growls.

Soundlessly he slipped out of bed, careful not to wake Kirstie. The room was a cage of stifling heat, the claustrophobic stuffiness only marginally relieved by the warm breeze through the windows. His underpants stuck to his groin and thighs in clinging patches; his torso was slick with droplets of perspiration.

He reached under the bed and withdrew a gun.

It was a 9mm Beretta 92SB pistol, which he had purchased at a gun show two years ago, after a rash of burglaries in their Danbury neighborhood. The blue-black barrel gleamed in the pale starlight.

He checked the clip to confirm that it was fully loaded. Sixteen 9mm Parabellum jacketed hollowpoints lay stacked on top of the magazine spring like sardines in a can.

Anastasia let out a louder sound, half cough, half bark. Kirstie stirred, murmured briefly in her sleep, but did not wake.

“Come on, girl,” Steve breathed.

He left the room, Anastasia padding after him.

The house seemed larger at night. It covered twenty-five hundred square feet, all on ground level; there was no cellar, no second story. The architecture was Spanish Colonial Revival: thick walls, lead-framed windows, hand-painted ceramic tile. Though much of the original decor had been ruined by the hurricane of ’35 and by years of neglect, Larson’s renovations had restored it.

Steve started with the guest bedroom, then checked out the bathroom, a nest of bright turquoise tile in floral patterns.

He proceeded down the long, tiled loggia that connected the two bedrooms and bath with the rest of the house. To his left was a wall of carved cedar, the recessed display cabinets holding terra-cotta curios. On his right, a row of French doors framed a corner of the patio and garden.