Paradise Falls (59 page)

“No,” she shook her head. “I can tell you where to find her. I was to take you to a slip at a marina on the Delaware river. Go there and you will find a launch that will take you to the ship. I’ll write down the address. Give me paper.”

Jacob slipped the back of a shipping manifest under her left hand, tucked a pen in her fingers. Clearly right-handed, her writing came out barely legible.

“What ship?”

“The vessel’s name is Causal Fridays. Her port of call is Monrovia, Liberia. It’s a freighter. I don’t know the cargo. I was not told.”

“How much do you know of the plan?”

She shook her head. “Only what I needed to know to accomplish my mission. I knew weapons were held here but I can’t tell you where they’re going or what they will be used for. I do not know. I swear it.”

Jacob nodded. “I believe you. I’m going to go, now. Are you sure you won’t let me take you to help?”

“No one can help me now. I failed.”

Jacob lurched away from her. He crushed a clot pad against the fresh wound on his arm, wrapped it up in tape to hold it in place, and stretched out his knee. The joint was white hot agony. More duct tape. He wrapped it around and around, steadying and supporting the knee with compression. The rest of the cuts were minor. He smeared some of the burning disinfectant and covered them over, got up, and put his gear back on, wincing at every movement.

He took the rifle and stopped at the door.

“At least let me call for help. I don’t want to leave you in the middle of nowhere to die.”

She shook her head.

He gave her a bottle of water, and a bottle of aspirin. He didn’t trust her with the opiates. She drank greedily, her good arm shaking so hard she could barely hold the bottle.

Then, Jacob left.

“Good luck,” she said, as he passed the door.

“Yeah. Call me if you want my help.”

“I’m not going to call.”

“I can help you, if you change your mind. Please.” he said, and before he could waste any more time, he limped down the stairs and walked past the dead men.

He was running out of time.

7.

Jennifer fell asleep.

She couldn’t believe it. Between everything else and the sheer noise of the rotors, she fell asleep and it took Katie nudging her shoulder to wake her up. Elliot was staring at her, wide-eyed. Jennifer blinked away the fatigue and looked around. The helicopter was descending. Off to her left she saw the sprawling southern end of Philadelphia and further out, the center city skyline.

The helicopter moved in an uneasy, eerie way that made her stomach hurt as it sort of steeped down in altitude, descending far too steeply towards the ground, and a big white H surrounded by a circle on blue. The chopper settled and when its weight pressed into the ground it gave her a jolt. Katie shifted in the seat and whimpered. Jennifer remained silent as Al Naab stepped out and his men opened the sliding side doors.

Jennifer stepped down, wincing on her ankles and struggling for balance with her hands behind her back. Katie almost fell into her and knocked her off balance, and she stumbled and ended up holding her sister up until she found her feet. Elliot, with his hands free, had an easier time of it. There was no time to talk, no time to think. The earmuffs came off her head and she ducked unnecessarily under the slowing rotors as she was pushed forward along the pavement.

They weren’t at the airport, for sure. She had no idea where they were, except for a vague sensation that they were southwest of the city. Jennifer went first into the back of a car, scooting up against the far door to make room for Katie. Elliot sat down on the other side and, silently, one of the Fangs got in to drive, another sitting in the front seat, facing backwards. He calmly, matter-of-factly displayed a pistol and turned around. The car started up and pulled away. Next to the drone of the chopper, it might as well have been silent.

She didn’t know where she was going and she didn’t ask.

“Where are we going?” Elliot blurted.

“Shut up,” said the man in the passenger’s seat.

“Do you know who I am?” Elliot snapped.

The Fang looked back at him.

“Some dead man.”

Elliot went pale, and his breathing quickened. Jennifer sat up, shifted so Katie had more room, but she still had to touch the loathsome creature in the other seat.

“I’m going to get us out of this,” said Elliot.

“No,” said Jennifer, “You’re not.”

She pulled at the duct tape around her wrists. Damn it, Jacob never taught her how to get out of duct tape.

Well, then. She just had to figure it out on her own.

Think
, Jennifer.

Duct tape.

Silvery stuff, tough, not really used on ducts. She remember reading that somewhere. One of those amusing factoids people love. Duct tape isn’t used on ducts! It had a strong adhesive. She knew because it pulled at her skin. Little threads running through it made it strong.

It couldn’t be
that
strong, though. People tore it with their bare hands. The person who bound her tore it with his bare hands. If only she had some way to get a tear started, but there was nothing sharp within reach.

Patience. If she freed herself now, there’d be nowhere to go anyway. They were pulling onto the Interstate, headed south. Her chest hurt, and she thought about Jacob again. Certainty. She would not believe he was dead. He’d find her somehow, but he was hours away, with no way of knowing where she was. If she was going to get out of this she was going to get
herself
out of this.

Think. Duct tape just stretched, unless a tear started somehow. She needed a way to start that tear something she could rub on, or something sharp to pierce it.

Pierce it.

Earrings.

She glanced at Katie, who just stared flatly into space. She didn’t even look back.

She was no help, and neither was Elliot.

How could she get an earring out of her ear? She could try grinding on the seat, maybe pull it loose that way, but that wasn’t exactly subtle.

Jennifer sat, and brooded. She watched through the windows, and no one made an effort to stop her. The car took I-495, and got off in the city of Wilmington. Jennifer didn’t know the area but she could smell rot. Her father one told her, on a shopping trip that took them through here to the mall further south, that the Cherry Island dump was alongside the highway. The odor changed, from sickly rot and garbage to the heavy, foul odor of industry and machinery and brackish water. The car threaded south down some side streets, through a rough looking neighborhood and came out on a broad avenue, then turned off again.

Jennifer knew this place. She came here with Franklin a few times while they were in college- the waterfront. There was a decrepit shopping mall down here that tried to be trendy, but further up was a working port. Cars came in here, filling vast asphalt lots with their numbers before they were shipped out all over the East Coast. Fruit came through the port, things like that. Something about the water here being deeper than further upriver at Philadelphia, and there were refineries. Once when she was very small her father drove the family down to Rehoboth Beach and Jennifer thought the refinery lights at Delaware City were, well, a city, not just lights on a great contraption of pipes that converted oil into gas; the actual Delaware City was just another town on the river, and she’d never had occasion to go there.

She blinked all that away. She was trying to retreat, fade back into her own memories. Stay in the present, stay focused. Stay cool.

No, not a port. They were going to a marina, even further down the river. She saw the boats lined up, sailboats and speedboats and yachts. The car turned off into a parking lot. The driver jumped out, yanked open her door and dragged her out by the arm. Elliot and Katie followed, pushed along behind Jennifer. The water smell filled her nostrils as she stumbled onto a boat. It wasn’t very big, but it had a cabin and a bridge up top. Katie and Elliot were pushed in behind her, and the door closed. The boat’s motor started with an angry whine and it shifted in the water, bobbing as it started to move.

Think.
 

“Katie,” she whispered.

Katie shifted, but didn’t move.

“Katie, damn it,” said Jennifer. “Look at me.”

Katie blinked again.

“I need you to listen to me. Bite off my earring and spit it into my hand.”

Katie looked at her, horrified, her mouth pulled into a trembling frown.

“Don’t argue with me. Just do it, and
do it
. Don’t make a mess of it.”

Katie nodded. Jennifer turned her head, like she was going to take a kiss on the cheek. Katie closed her teeth on Jennifer’s earring, and pulled as Jennifer yanked away. The pain was intense, sharp and stabbing. Katie shuddered and heaved forward and Jennifer caught a big wad of spit, blood, and her earring in her fingers. Wincing, she smeared her hands against her backside and clawed at the earring, trying to get a grip on it. The sharp stem dug into her skin, but that would do. Ignoring the throbbing pain in her earlobe, she worked it in her fingers until she had a good grip on it, and twisted her hands to poke at the tape. It was hard, and she had to hold the earring in her fingertips and contort and twist her hand to poke at the tape with the sharp end, and every time it caught, she was afraid she’d drop it, especially when the boat moved in the water.

It worked. She poked a hole, then another. She pulled at the tape, but it wouldn’t move.

“Let me help,” said Elliot.

Jennifer stared at him.

“Come near me and I’ll kick you in the balls,” she said, flatly.

Elliot shrank back in his seat and stared at her as she grunted and shifted. She ended up smearing the blood from her ear on her shirt, and finally pressing against the seat, trying to stop the bleeding. There was more than she expected and if she got out of the cabin with fresh blood on her, it would draw attention. Damn it.

Another poke, another hole. The earring caught in the tape, and she almost dropped it. She needed some small tears, enough that when she pulled at the tape it would start coming apart. Just enough, a few more little holes. She started working the earring, as much as she dared using the stem to widen the little tears, stopping when she thought the thin stem might bend or break. Ultimately she put as many holes in her fingers as she did the tape, and one time she tensed up as the stem almost slid under her fingernail before she stopped it. Just the thought made her seize up and shiver and she had to force the image out of her head.

The boat turned. It slowed. She could hear another vessel outside, even if she couldn’t see it. A huge engine, and the churning of water.

The cabin door open and she was pulled out.

Rising high overhead was the rust-and-black side of a cargo freighter, moving with the water. There were lights in the distance but they were far off, twinkling points on the horizon and little more than stars. The smaller boat moved alongside the freighter, and there was a ladder hanging down. One of the Fangs took a knife and cut the duct tape away from her wrists.

Jennifer wanted to start laughing but she didn’t. She slipped the loose earring in her back pocket.

As Katie’s wrists were freed, she clung to Jennifer.

“I can’t climb that.”

“Up,” the Fang barked, dragging her over.

“I can’t!”

“Up, or in the water,” he snapped. He pointed towards the freighter’s stern. “There. Propeller.”

Katie froze.

“Go,” said Jennifer. “I’ll be right behind you.”

“Try anything at top,” said the Fang, “back in the water. Understood?”

Jennifer nodded. Katie started climbing up, and Jennifer went right behind her as promised, slowing as Katie shakily, awkwardly hauled herself up the ladder, hugging the slick rungs with her arm and taking them one at a time. Halfway up she started to cry.

Elliot followed them up. Jennifer felt his breath on her back.

“Elliot,” she said, calmly. “If you so much as touch my ass I will kick you right in the face.”

Katie snickered, and started to climb. When she reached the top, hands seized her arms and hauled her over and away. Jennifer mounted the top and let them take her and pull her onboard.

Elliot clambered up on his own and put his hands up reflexively as the Fangs from the boat below brought up the rear. Jennifer saw it swing away and head back to the marina.

Al Naab walked over, moving languidly with the motion of the deck.

“Ah,” he said, “there you are. Bring them.”

From the outside, the ship (
or was it a boat?
Jennifer was hazy on how size factored into that distinction) looked ratty and weather-worn, but now that she was actually on it it seemed weirdly clean, like the rough appearance from the outside was camouflage. It probably was. The ship or boat or whatever it was was headed upriver, past Wilmington. Jennifer could see the lights off to her left… to starboard. Or was that port? No, port was left. Starboard was right. It had something to do with the way ships were built before the invention of the steering wheel, they used a board mounted on the right side to… Jennifer shook her head and tried to push out the silly, intrusive thoughts. It was fatigue, or fear.

They led her through a door (bulkhead?) and down into the cargo bay. Again, all very new and clean. Three big shapes sat under heavy canvas tarps.

“I want to show you something,” said Al Naab.

Jennifer swallowed, hard.

Two of his men pulled the tarp away, and Jennifer stared. What lay beneath was not especially remarkable. It looked like a fifty gallon drum, though oddly smooth and covered with a kind of canvas skin with mounting straps, and electronic box on top. By their outlines, all three were the same thing.

“What is…” she started to say.

“Holy shit,” Elliot breathed.

Katie just stared.

Jennifer knew the symbol on the side. Three truncated triangles, branching out from a small black circle. A radiation symbol.

“What you are seeing does not officially exist,” said Al Naab. “What does not officially exist is very expensive. So expensive, it would take the wealth of a toppled dictatorial regime to purchase it,” he sighed. “When Jacob Kane stole my money, he set the operation back by years, but we recovered. We are patient. Now we have three of them.”