A boat waited at the end.
She looked frantically around the small cove at the other river houses, but most were dark. Would anybody see her? Even so, through the rain, would they see she needed help? Or was she just a blur with Kyle moving toward a boat?
It was an aluminum river sled, maybe twenty-four feet long, low and narrow. A fishing boat without a cabin. It had a center console with a small windscreen, two bucket seats bolted behind it, and a seating bench toward the back.
Kyle marched her down the dock.
She fought him with a hard kick to his shin at the last second, trying to twist away toward the bank. He threw her into the boat, and she hit the deck on her knees next to Jack’s body. Pain shot up her thighs. Rain plastered her hair to her face.
Kyle stepped toward her, grabbed her by the collar of her lab coat, and hauled her up. “You’re riding back here.” He shoved her onto the rear seat.
Jack’s body lay on the bottom of the boat, partially on its side. Blood pooled on the aluminum below him.
Peter came running down the dock, his shirt soaked through and his breathing hard. “I handled it. The clinic’s clean, and there’s no visible blood in the examination room.”
Kyle nodded like they were discussing a meeting agenda. “Good.”
Peter didn’t even look at her.
Kyle handed him the gun. “Shoot her if she moves, but try not to kill her. I’m looking forward to squeezing the life out of this bitch.”
“We need to make it look like the other deaths.” Peter looked frantically around, his body visibly vibrating. “We don’t have time to take her to Two Trout Creek, but if we dump her by the side of this one, it’s close enough.” His gaze landed on Jack. “We’ll need to bury him somewhere else.”
May’s head spun, and her stomach revolted. Her best move was to wait until they were headed out of the alcove to jump from the boat. Could she swim with her hands bound?
Kyle untied the boat and stepped up to the console. He turned the key, and the jet motor caught with a metallic growl. The aluminum hull shuddered as the intake grabbed water, and the vibration ran straight through the deck and into May’s spine.
Rain slashed sideways now. The sky had lowered into something heavy and bruised. Wind ripped across the wide river and churned it into rough, uneven chop. Spray slapped hard against the hull.
May braced herself and tried again at the knot around her wrists, dragging the bandage against the metal base of the bench seat. It scraped. Not enough. She pulled harder.
The dock shrank behind them and the house blurred in the rain. The river opened wide and powerful ahead of them, gray and unforgiving. They were headed upstream.
Rain smashed down on her, keeping her cold and alert. There was no way she was letting them kill her. She bunched her muscles to leap, and Peter steadied his aim at her. “You’ll be dead before you hit the water, Dr. Smirnov.”
She trembled, but anger rushed through her. Okay. She’d have to tackle him and get that gun. The second the boat pitched, and it would in this storm, she’d make a move. She might survive a gunshot wound.
There wasn’t a choice.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Two vehicles sat outside Kyle Mercer’s rented mansion, a Buick and a newer truck. Small dots of red were visible leading around the side of the home, the rain splattering and spreading them. Ace swallowed, shoving panic away. “This way.”
He ran around the house with Christian at his heels, reaching the rear of the home near the river. The house was dark and quiet behind them. Tika whined, his nose to the ground.
That couldn’t be May’s blood. It just couldn’t be. Ace stared at the empty dock. The boat that came with Kyle’s rental house was gone. Shit. “There are no good reasons to take that boat out in this storm.”
Christian nodded. “Agreed.” Fury swirled in his green and black eyes.
Ace turned, scanning the area. Then he started to run, hitting rocky bank and going past the quiet houses on stilts. He ran over the slick dock to reach the pitching Cessna Caravan. Torrington should’ve secured her inside the boathouse. Ace jumped on the float and then careened into the pilot’s seat.
Christian hefted himself into the other seat and tossed Tika into the back. “Brock can be here in fifteen minutes. He can pilot this thing.”
“There’s no time,” Ace said, his brain clicking facts into place. “May is gone, and so is the boat. It’s storming, and Kyle’s making some kind of move.” Maybe Kyle thought he could get away with it because there was another killer out there.
Ace flipped on the master switch and ran through the startup sequence. His hands moved automatically, muscle memory taking over as something old and cold tried to crawl up his spine. He forced it down.
This wasn’t the ocean, and he wasn’t spinning or falling. It was a wide river and a controlled takeoff. He had to get to May. Right now.
