Mason grunted his agreement.
“What did he say?” Alex asked Maddy from the side of her mouth.
They were standing shoulder to shoulder on the bridge, watching as four of the six crew members on the Coast Guard boat scrambled around the deck, throwing over bumpers in preparation for tying up next to the motor yacht, which was the kind of ship owned by the one-percenters of the world but not the one percent of the one-percenters. With a main deck for seating, dining, and a small galley, and a lower level that was likely separated into a couple of cramped cabins, the vessel was nice without being ostentatious like her father’s yacht, theBlack Gold.
Running lights on both ships cast a cool, dim glow over the dark water surrounding them. And Maddy noticed two of the people on the motor yacht were standing on the narrow front deck, watching the activity aboard the cutter. They were both men, both dressed in what she’d come to recognize as standard yachting wear—Polo shirts and blindingly white shorts—and neither of them seemed to be injured. For that, she breathed a sigh of relief and hoped whoeverwasinjured wasn’t hurt terribly bad.
“He said he’s got a bad feelin’ about this,” she whispered to Alex, watching how the two yachters caught the ropes the Coast Guard crew tossed them, quickly and efficiently tethering the vessels together.
Alex frowned. “Looks legit to me,” she said.
“Me too,” Maddy agreed. “But if something is wigglin’ their antennas…” She hooked a thumb toward Mason and Bran and let the sentence dangle.
“Captain,” Bran turned to Webber, a man whose leather face and sun-bleached hair spoke of a lifetime at sea. “I’m gonna take the women belowdecks, and then Mason and I will assume a defensive position, if you don’t mind.”
Webber, behind the controls in the captain’s chair, narrowed his eyes. “You see something that makes you think this isn’t a real Mayday call?” he asked.
“Nope.” Bran shook his head. “But not too long ago I was in a situation where a Mayday ended up in a shitload of bloodshed, and there was nothing to make me think it wasn’t on the up-and-up until the moment guns were blazing.” Sure enough. Maddy had been there too. And in this case she fully supported theHistory…don’t make me repeat myselfslogan on Alex’s shirt. “Let’s just say that since then I’d rather err on the side of caution. Have you…uh…have you checked the radar?”
“Nothing showing up for miles around but a fishing trawler,” Webber reported, motioning with a finger toward the radar screen. “There’s no sign of the dinghy. The two goons are probably out of range by now.”
“Right.” Bran nodded. “But I’d still feel better if we covered all our bases.”
For three ticks of the clock Webber regarded him. Then he dipped his chin. “Do what you have to do to set your mind at ease, sailor.”
Bran nodded his thanks before shepherding Alex and Maddy through the door of the bridge.
“So what doesassume a defensive positionmean?” Maddy asked, her heart rate spiking as they tromped down the stairs into the belly of the cutter.
“It means we’re gonna arm you ladies to the teeth, leave you with the girls, and play ourselves a little game of watch-and-wait,” Bran explained, motioning them toward the ship’s small galley. “If all is aboveboard? Great. If not, we’ll be ready.”
“Arm us?” Alex squeaked. “Just so we’re clear, I’ve never held a gun in my life.”
“It’s easier than it looks,” Mason muttered from the back of the pack.
“Oh, sonowyou’re talking to me?” Alex demanded, craning her head around to lift a brow in Mason’s direction.
Maddy ignored them, instead looking at the weapons arranged atop the pristine white dropcloth draped over the galley’s metal trestle table. Bran and Mason’s machine guns, as well as the machine guns the bad guys had left on Garden Key, were in a neat row, paper tags tied around their triggers.
“We were surrendering them as evidence,” Bran explained.
Evidence.Of the carnage that is this night.
“Where is Rick?” Alex asked, reminding Maddy of the young man who’d been dragged into this nightmare with her. “Shouldn’t we be arming him too? Or better yet, shouldn’t we be arming himinstead? I’m sure he’d be much better than me when it comes to—”
“He went down in the hold ten minutes ago to check on the bodies and make sure that one-eighty we did didn’t jostle them loose and have them rolling across the floor,” Bran explained.
Ew,Maddy thought, bile climbing into her throat.
“Ew,” Alex said, making a face and proving the two of them had more in common than jabber jaws.
“So for right now, you’re it,” Mason told Alex, grabbing one of the weapons, ripping off the tag, and handing it to her. She held it in front of her like it might be a live grenade.
Bran slammed a magazine into his machine gun and then threw the strap over his shoulder before presenting Maddy with one of the remaining weapons. The assault rifle was heavier than she imagined. The metal was cool and menacing to the touch. Unlike Alex, shehadheld a gun before. But never one like this. One that felt like pure, raw, unrepentant death.
She tried her best to hide her revulsion and her shaking hands as she went through the instructions Bran quickly listed. How to change it from safety mode to firing mode? Check. How to slam in a new magazine when the old one ran dry? Check, check. How toaim and spray, as he called it? Triple check.
And triple gulp too.
