Storm Surge (26 page)

Mercer nodded.
“Double
cross.”

“Exactly.
Which is another
reason why I’m cheerfully telling you all of this.
”

“Okay,” Mercer said. He stood up and
drew his pistol.

“Been nice knowing you fellows,”
Phillips said almost jauntily.

“Mercer,”
Bohler
said.

“He knows the score, Deputy.”

“No,”
Bohler
said insistently. He had taken headset off and was holding it out. “Listen.”

Phillips saw Mercer take the headset
and put it on. He touched the earpiece to key the mike. “I’m here.” Then his
face went blank with shock. “They’ve got Glory,” he said.

CHAPTER
SIXTY-THREE

The water downstairs was knee deep,
muddy and slicked with oil. The house had taken on a dank, moldy smell that
stuck in the back of Blake’s throat. He was going to be glad to get the hell
out of this place. He looked across the room at the terrified girl sitting in
the leather upholstered wing chair on the other side of the desk. Moon stood
behind her, the barrel of his machine gun pointed at her head.

“That’s right, Mercer,” Blake said.
“Your little friend decided to go outside and admire the view. My colleague
practically stumbled over her.”

There was a pause, then Mercer’s voice
came back, tight with rage. “What about the woman?”

“My colleague,” Blake said, his tone
almost jolly, “didn’t know if the woman was armed. So he decided that, if he
had the girl, the woman would come to us.
And you as well.
And Barney Fife, if you haven’t killed him already.
He’s a smart fellow, my colleague.” His voice hardened. “And I’d suggest you do
just that.”

“I’ve got a counter offer.” Mercer
said.

“You’re bargaining with the girl’s
life?”

“No.
Yours.
I’ve got your sparkplugs. I’ve also got your friend from the lighthouse.
Which means I hold the lighthouse itself.
”

Blake fought to contain his shock and
anger. “You’ve got…” he stopped, got himself under control. “I’m listening.”

“I trade you your British
friend—sorry, colleague-- and the plugs for the girl.”

“What about the lighthouse?”

“We let you and what’s left of your
team in.
Unarmed.
When this is over, you take whatever
it is you got out of that safe and get off the island just the way you planned.
Remember, I’m not in any hurry to contact anyone official. The woman and the
girl will keep their mouths shut.”

“What about Barney Fife? I don’t think
he’ll be too anxious to go along with this plan. Unless you’ve already…”

“I’ll take care of him.”

Blake chuckled. “You know, Mercer, I
kind of like the way you think. It’s too bad things shook out this way. We
might have been friends.”

“Just as well.
I’ve seen the way you treat your
friends.”

“You should see what happens to my
enemies.
There’s
two problems with this plan, Mercer.
One is that, without the lighthouse, my British friend, as you put it, really
isn’t of any use to me. He’s actually more of a liability, to tell you the
truth, since he’s apparently told you a large part of our plan.”

“How about if I
offer to take care of him, too?
To sweeten the deal?”

“Frankly, right now, I don’t care.”

“What’s the other problem?”

“Well, I have to admit, I feel kind of
foolish. In all the brouhaha over the sparkplugs, there was one thing I failed
to consider. It took my female colleague, of all people, to explain it to me.”

“Montrose.”

“I see Mr. Phillips
has
been
very chatty. Yes. Montrose. She noted that there are a lot of houses on this
island. And most of them have generators. And some of those use the same type
of plugs as the generator here. And, as luck would have it, the house next door
has the same make and model. We’ve got the plugs from that one. So right now,
we don’t need Phillips, we don’t need the sparkplugs,
we
really don’t need much of anything, except the lighthouse.” The lights in the
office flickered and came back on. Blake smiled benevolently at Glory. She was
visibly trembling, tears running down her face.

“So here’s the deal,” he said, “Take
it or leave it. We keep the girl here with us as insurance against you doing
anything stupid. When our work here is complete, you give us the lighthouse, we
give you the girl. You take your chances finding shelter elsewhere. But you get
a chance to live. More than you gave Worth and Barstow.
Oh,
and one more thing.”

There was silence on the other end.

“You take care of Phillips and that
idiot cop.
Now.”

More silence.

“I need to hear your agreement,
Mercer.” Blake snapped. “If I don’t, life’s going to start being very difficult
for this little girl.”

Another long pause.
Then: “Okay.
Done.”

“Very good.
I expect to see you here, at the
house, very soon.” He heard a noise outside. “And you’d better hurry,” he said.
“The wind’s picking up. I think the eye’s almost past.”

There was no answer.

Blake took the headset off.

“You think he’ll do it?” Moon asked.

“I don’t know,” Blake said. “I think
he’ll take out the deputy and Phillips, for his own reasons. There’s no point
in him leaving them alive, and I imagine the cop wants to take him in.”

“He hasn’t killed the cop yet?”

“No,” Blake said, “He didn’t say ‘I
already took care of it.”

“Kind of odd,” Moon said.

Montrose came in, looked around at the
lights, and smiled. Blake gave her thumbs up. She walked over and started
adjusting the plasma cutter. “In any case,” Blake said, “We’ve got work to do
in the meantime.” Blake stood up and walked around to stand beside Glory. He
patted her on the shoulder. “Don’t look at the light, honey,” he said, his tone
that of a fond uncle. Glory managed to avert her eyes as the plasma cutter lit
up the room again.

“I’ll take her in the other room,”
Blake said. He used his grip on Glory’s shoulder to pull her to her feet.
“So Montrose can work.
Moon, you go outside and wait for Mr.
Mercer.”

“He’ll kill you,” Glory said
defiantly. “He’ll come for me, and he’ll kill you. Just like the others.”

No one answered.

CHAPTER
SIXTY-FOUR

“What did he say?”
Bohler
asked.

“I’m supposed to kill you and
Phillips,” Mercer said. “And they’ll give me the girl.”

Phillips grimaced. “I can’t say I’m
surprised.”

Bohler
was looking steadily at Mercer. “So?”

“So what?”

Bohler
raised his weapon slightly. “Are you
going to…
”

“Don’t be an asshole,
Bohler
,” Mercer said. “If I was going to kill you, I
wouldn’t have told you beforehand. And besides, I made a promise.”

“To who?”

“I promised Sharon.”

Bohler
looked dumbfounded. “You did?”

Mercer nodded. “She said you didn’t
need killing.
You going
to make me regret the
promise?”

“Depends.
What are you going to do?”

“Well,” Mercer said, “I’m going to go
get the girl. And In the process, I’m going to kill the motherfuckers who took
her.”

Bohler
nodded. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Yeah.”

“Even the killing part?”

“I don’t have any problem with killing
these animals, Mercer. But as a law enforcement officer, I’m supposed to use it
as a last resort.”

“That’s your problem. You keep
assuming that the law applies here. The law went out to sea when that storm
hit.”

Bohler
shook his head. “I can’t believe
that. I won’t live like that.”

“If you don’t start living like that,
those animals, as you put it, will kill you.”

“I’m afraid he’s right,” Phillips
spoke up. “They’re
mot
the sort who’ll take
gracefully to being arrested.”

“You did,”
Bohler
said.

“Except that if he gets a chance, or
even half of one, he’ll try to kill both of us and escape,” Mercer said.
“Right?”

Phillips smiled. “I must decline to
answer that one,” he said, “on the grounds that the answer might tend to
incriminate me. Or get me killed.”

“Exactly,” Mercer said. “
Which is why you stay here with him,
Bohler
.
”

“Wait a minute…”

“I’m not leaving him at my back,
unguarded,” Mercer said. “You want to come with
me,
I
have to kill him now.”

“I can’t say I prefer that option,”
Phillips said.

“You don’t get a vote.
How about it,
Bohler
?”

Bohler
looked at him without speaking.
Frustration clouded his face. Outside, they could hear the wind. It was rising
again. Soon it would be back to full force.

“Come on,” Phillips said. “We’ll have
a fine time. Are you a reader, by any chance?”

“Shut up,”
Bohler
said.

There was a banging on the door
downstairs,
then
the door slammed open.
“MERCER!”
Sharon’s voice came from below. She sounded
panicked.

“Up here,” Mercer called back.

They heard her pounding up the steps,
then
she was in the watch room.

“They’ve got Glory,” she panted.

“I know,” Mercer said. “I’m going
after her.”

“I’m coming with you,” she said.

“No.
No way.”

“It’s not open for discussion, Mercer.
She’s my daughter.”

“I know. But these people are
professionals. You’re not.”

“I don’t care. She’s my
daughter
,
Kyle.”

“That doesn’t make you any faster with
a gun. Or better with a knife. You freaked out at what I did to the guy who had
you tied up.
The guy who was going to rape and kill you both.
You think you could do that? You think you’ve got what it takes to do something
like that?”

“To save my
daughter’s life?
You bet your sweet ass I do, Mercer.” She stood facing him, hands on her hips,
her eyes ablaze.

“Never let them give you to the
women,” Phillips murmured, as if to
himself
.

She turned to face him. “Who the hell
are you?” A look of recognition crossed her face. “You’re one of them.”

He bowed slightly, as much as he could
from a sitting position. “My name is Phillips,” he began, but she was across
the room before he could get any more words out. She kicked him in the stomach,
hard. He barely had time to brace for the blow, but it doubled him over anyway.
He writhed in agony, gasping for air.

“How does it feel, you son of a
bitch?” she hissed. “How does it feel to be helpless? How does it feel to be
afraid
?”
Her voice cracked on the last word.
Bohler
had
grabbed her shoulder from behind, but she shook him off. “How does it
feel
!?”
she screamed.

“Not…wonderful,” Phillips gasped.

“You want to see if I can kill
someone, Kyle?” she said. “Give me a gun and I’ll do this asshole right now.”

Mercer reached behind, pulled the
pistol out from the small of his back, and handed it to her without speaking.

“Mercer,”
Bohler
said. “Ms. Brennan.” His voice was desperate.

She had the gun pointed down at
Phillips. “Get up,” she whispered savagely.

He struggled to a sitting position.
“Well,” he said, “I can’t say I ever imagined it’d end this way.” He was trying
to maintain his accustomed jaunty air, but his voice shook slightly. “I don’t
suppose it would do any good to point out that I never touched your daughter.”

“No,” she said. “It won’t.”

“Ms. Brennan,”
Bohler
said firmly. He raised his weapon to point at her. “Put the gun down.”

“
Bohler
,”
Mercer said. “You put yours down.” He had his own machine gun pointed at
Bohler
. “Let her do what she has to do.”