kiDNApped (A Tara Shores Thriller) (17 page)

“I’m going with you. I am
not
staying on this tomb by myself,” Kristen said.

Dave said, “Okay. Just be careful. We’ll have to wade across the stream. It’s shallow but the rocks are covered with moss and algae and are very slippery, so watch your step. And then when we get to the other side, keep an eye out for the boars—they have been known to charge a person, especially when they feel threatened.”

“Got it. After you,” she said, sweeping a hand over the gurgling brook.

With a last glance up and downstream for Lance or the boat, Dave stooped down, put two hands on the lowest railing bar, and hung down over the side of the once majestic yacht. Then he let himself drop into the shallow water, careful to land his feet on relatively flat terrain.

When he was situated, he held both arms out for Kristen. She hung over the side as he had done, and let herself drop into Dave’s arms. The embrace felt good to both of them, and Dave took his time in letting her go. Tara had easily made the jump and was already half way to the other bank. She led the way as they picked their way across the stream, surprised at how cold the rushing water was.

Tara parted the grass at the edge of the other side. She pulled her Glock from its holster and held it at the ready in case the boars should charge at them. “Hey! Hey!” she called out, a warning for the pigs. She didn’t want to sneak up and startle them. And maybe Lance would hear her, too. The pigs definitely did, though, because they heard the trampling of hooves rushing away from them. Feeling safer, the search party stepped out of the stream.

They found themselves on the edge of a clearing, beyond which stood a thick, tropical forest. Scanning the small field, it was obvious that neither Lance nor the boat were here. Dave said what they were all thinking.

“If Lance walked into that forest, he would have left the boat somewhere right around here. It’s too heavy for one person to drag very far.” Kristen nodded in silent agreement, her concern growing. She began to walk toward the edge of the forest.

“Where are you going?” Tara asked, catching up with her.

“I just want to look through those trees a little bit.” They reached the edge of the clearing. A tall stand of eucalyptus and bamboo trees marked the edge of the forest. A barely noticeable footpath snaked its way into the lush vegetation.

Dave nodded as they stepped onto the path. “That’s what this is. It covers a lot of square miles, over some really rough terrain. You might recognize parts of it from the movie
Jurassic Park
—they filmed some of the jungle scenes here.”

Kristen raised her eyebrows. “Five minutes tops.”

The light diffused as they entered the forest, the thick canopy above filtering out the day’s bright rays. It felt instantly cooler. Their wet shoes made squishing noises as they crunched over the carpet of leaf litter and twigs on the rain forest floor. Ferns dotted the landscape, some taller than Dave. Birdcalls echoed throughout the trees. Two large dragonflies chased each other through the understory.

After three minutes of walking, Tara said, “As much as I’m enjoying our little nature walk, Kristen, we've got to get back to the stream. Lance must have gone downriver. Where else could he be?”

“Why would he do that?”

“I don’t know,” Tara said, the first trace of annoyance starting to show in her voice, “but we should get downstream and if he’s not there, I'll get a formal search party going.”

“Okay,” Kristen said. “So how are we going to get back down? Walk?”

Dave winced, as if in pain. “That's going to be quite a hike, but I guess we should get going. We don’t want to be out here at night.”

And then the rain, which had slowed to a sprinkle, began to come down again in earnest. The thick cover of the canopy reduced its direct force, but the steady percussion of water drumming on leaves thundered all around them. Tara took in the surroundings.

“No sign that anyone’s been this way,” she said, raising her voice slightly to be heard above the rain. She felt a sudden sting on her leg and looked down in time to see a large mosquito fly off. “Didn’t think to bring any bug spray. You guys have any?”

Dave reached into his pack and tossed her a small spray bottle. He's earning Kristen's guide fee, Tara thought as she applied the insect repellent. Then she pointed through some banana palm fronds down a gentle slope. “We'll have a quick look down this hill and then it’s back to the river.” Dave and Kristen agreed.

They brushed through a stand of wet ferns to the edge of the incline. They heard it before they saw it: A small waterfall emerging from an outcropping of volcanic rock to meander down the forested grade.

But it wasn’t the stream itself which commanded their attention.

On the bank of the small stream, leaning up against a tree trunk, were four black tire tubes, from a large car or a small truck. Dave trotted up to them and picked one up, examining it. Kristen and Tara continued a short ways down the hill, surveying the vast tract of uninterrupted forest below. After a minute they returned to the waterfall and stood next to Dave.

“Nothing out of the ordinary down there that I can see,” Tara said. Kristen concurred.

Dave nodded and handed an inner tube to each of the women. “You take these, I'll take this one, “ he said, grabbing a tube for himself.

“Whatever for?” Kristen asked.

“Local kids use these to float down streams and irrigation canals left over from the sugar cane days—‘fluming da ditches’ they call it.”

…GAGT
31
TTCC...

12:54 PM

Tara set her inner tube in the water. She glanced around the area of the wrecked yacht. Still finding no signs of Lance or the raft, she stepped into the old tire tube and sat down, her legs hooked over one side while her elbows were propped up on the other. A few feet away, Dave followed suit.

“Sorry, but this is the most effective mode of transportation I could come up with on such short notice. But I bet we’ll make pretty good time.”

To illustrate his point, Dave removed the hand from the rock he’d been using to steady himself. He moved steadily downstream away from Kristen. When he was ten feet from her, he latched onto a protruding stick and waited. Tara floated past him, wondering what her supervisor would have to say about this one. She took a digital picture of Dave and Kristen in their inner tubes.
No way the guys at the office will believe this.

Shaking her head and muttering, “I can’t believe I’m doing this,” Kristen dropped her inner tube into the river and sat down in it. She pushed off a smooth, mossy stone and linked hands with Dave as she reached him. Together, they drifted out to the center of the stream, and, slowly at first, they began to drift down toward the ocean.

As they glided past the shipwreck, portions of its white hull peaking at them through the foliage as they floated past, the smile faded from Kristen’s face. The tubing had given her a moment of elation, but it vanished as she pictured the dead men entombed within the walls of the broken boat.

Tara called out to Kristen as they began floating downstream away from the
Tropic Sequence.
“Kristen, you said you had a GPS?”

“Yes, almost forgot. I’ll mark our position.” She pulled her GPS unit from a pocket, careful not to drop it into the rushing water. She marked the position where her father’s prized yacht had met its end.

As they rounded a bend in the stream and left the wreck behind, the horrific sight of her father’s dead crew temporarily retreated from Kristen’s mind. She was kept busy navigating the twisty little river in the inner tube, at times needing to kick off of a boulder to get back on course in the middle of the waterway. Soon the river widened and deepened, and their speed increased to the point that they needed their hands free to fend off obstacles if need be.

The trio retraced the course they had taken that morning in reverse, winding their way down through the rain forest. Twirling about in their tubes, they would gaze up at a sheer wall of vegetation one moment and then down the bubbling expanse of whitewater the next. They glided down the river, seeing no people besides themselves. Occasionally they called out Lance’s name, but received no response.

After an hour of drifting with the current, they emerged from the heavy jungle into the flatter terrain of the taro wetlands. The river broadened here, but also slowed. They were grateful for the sun’s rays, which hit them directly now. Sitting in the river for over an hour was proving chilly. Dave passed around some sunscreen from his backpack.

After thirty more slow-drifting minutes, they saw a group of kayakers ahead in the distance, just before the river made its final bend to the ocean.

When they reached the group of touring kayakers, they asked them if anyone had seen a gray raft. They reported that they had not. Tara found it amusing that no one thought it odd to see three adults floating around on inner tubes. Everyone assumed they were tourists just having fun. The inner-tubers floated around the last bend in the river into the straightaway which led to the sea.

Being midday, this area of the river was now packed with activity—multitudes of kayakers, rafters, tour boats and swimmers plied the waterway, and a few fishermen cast lines from the river’s banks. Tara, Kristen and Dave drifted on, looking for Lance and their raft amidst the aquatic activity.

After a long while Tara announced, “I see something.” She pointed to the right-hand bank into a thick cluster of bushes which jutted out into the current. Something sat in the bushes, unmoving. As they drew nearer, they could see that it might be gray.

“Whatever it is, it’s tucked in there pretty good,” Kristen said.

“We better check it out,” Dave said, using both hands to paddle his tube toward the unidentified object. Kristen and Tara followed suit, and soon they approached the stand of shrubbery protruding well into the river. The river’s recreational users ignored them as they splashed their way closer to whatever it was in the bushes.

Dave reached the stand of plants first. He pushed some leaves aside and peered through the greenery.

“Lance!” Tara heard him shout. “Yo, Lance—you okay?”

…TTAT
32
TTTA...

2:12 PM

Lance lay unmoving, sprawled across the Avon’s floorboards. The hood of his sweatshirt covered his face. The boat was not tied off or anchored in any way, but appeared to have come to rest at this spot at the whim of the river’s currents. Its bow faced away from them, further into the foliage.

“Is he okay?” Kristen called out, straining to see into the boat from her sitting position in the inner-tube.

“Don’t know yet,” Dave answered. He reached the Avon shortly before Tara, and together they grabbed a line on the Avon and used it to haul themselves out of the inner-tube and flop into the boat.

And then Lance moved. He stretched and yawned before sitting bolt upright. “Who—” He held an arm out in self-defense.

“Lance, it’s me, Agent Shores. I’m with Dave and your sister.”

“Lance, what happened?” Kristen asked, pulling herself alongside the Avon. Lance relaxed a bit, lowering his arm. He brushed off the hood of his sweatshirt, revealing tousled hair and bleary eyes.

“Dave...Kristen!” he began. “Ohmygosh.” He picked his cellular off the floorboards and glanced at its display. “2:15. Oh wow, I’m sorry. I guess I fell asleep, and...where am I?” Lance made a show of trying to see through the plant life crowding the boat. “Are we—”

“We’re all the way downriver, Lance!” Kristen said. “When we came out from the
Tropic Sequence
, you were gone.” She went on to explain how they had looked for him around the yacht before tubing their way down here.

Lance shook his head and took a deep breath. The four of them reboarded the Avon while Lance told his version of events. “Last thing I remember I thought I saw something in the plants near Dad’s boat. I untied the Avon from the yacht so I could have a look around while I waited for you guys to come back out. I paddled over and checked it out but it turned out to be nothing. Just a pile of branches, like a beaver damn or something. Are there beavers here?” He looked at Dave, who shook his head. Tara quietly observed Lance as he told his story.

Lance shrugged, unfazed. “So then I just tied the Avon up to some branches—not far from the yacht at all—and I laid down to rest. I didn’t mean to, but I fell asleep, and then the line must have come undone. I can’t believe I drifted all this way while I was sleeping!”

Kristen frowned and said, “I can’t believe that either, Lance. It’s a pretty bumpy ride in some spots.”

“He was pretty tired from the other night,” Dave said. Lance nodded. “And I have been told that I sleep through anything,” he said with a sheepish grin.

Kristen glared hard at her brother. “You mean to tell me that after you found the missing boat of our father, who’s been gone without a trace for three months, that you just fell asleep?”

“I was super-tired. I’ve been through a lot the last couple of days,” Lance said. “So what did you guys find inside the
Tropic Sequence
?”