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Yuki searched the silhouetted grouping of men. Some men stood, but more squatted or sat on the deck behind a ragged line of gunmen. She counted about six of them.
A bright flash in the unrelenting dark caught her eye. It was Brady’s hair. She was sure of it.
He was standing toward the back of the crowd, and she wanted to screw everything and just run to him. But she knew that was irrational. She didn’t even dare to draw his attention. She couldn’t put him in danger. Her tears welled up as she thought about how close he was while so far away.
Just then, as if she had summoned him with her fear, Jackhammer walked onto the track above the Pool Deck, that long, hollow rectangle, with its gun’s-eye view of the passengers.
CHAPTER 59
JACKHAMMER CAME DOWN the metal stairs, and when he reached the Pool Deck, he stepped through the shadows and began to cut through the crowd.
He walked to the long side of the pool and raked the passengers left and right with his eyes. His sickening gaze seemed to stop on her and then, having touched her, move on.
Jackhammer cleared his throat and said, “I’m so sorry for the inconvenience, everyone. I know this stinks, but, you know, if it were up to me, you would be back to your vacation. Eating good food. Enjoying the good life.
“But your captain can’t get anywhere with your cruise line. Apparently there is an obstacle, which means more of you will die. If only the cruise line would wire the money we have asked f
or. Well for now, be happy that unlike the captain and crew you have fresh air, and perhaps by morning some of you will have breakfast. Sound good?”
Jackhammer turned as one of his men came toward him. They bent their heads toward each other, conferring. Were they talking about her? Yuki saw movement from the stern: a gray-haired man in bright-green pajama bottoms was running in bare feet, holding a deck chair over his head.
Oh, my God, this passenger had snapped.
He stretched up and hurled the chair at Jackhammer, who saw the chair coming toward him and stepped aside.
A woman cried out, “No, Larry, no!”
Jackhammer had his gun aimed even before the chair crashed to the deck. He fired on the gray-haired man. His wife broke through arms that were holding her in place and ran toward her fallen and dying husband.
Jackhammer fired again and the woman’s body jerked before she collapsed on her husband’s chest.
The shots and the killings sent the entire deck into motion. Those people near the bleeding bodies fell back, and then panic sent all of the women to the far side of the pool. People slipped on the blood-slicked deck and fell. The strongest trampled the weak. Pirates slammed gun butts into passengers, who made for the doorways and staircases.
Gunmen fired in bursts above the heads of passengers, who were screaming like animals being slaughtered.
It was inside this sheer chaos that Yuki saw her opportunity. Obscuring herself among the hundreds of shifting people, Yuki edged along the length of the deck. By the time the shooting stopped, Yuki had resurfaced beside the man she loved.
Brady drew her into his arms, cloaking her entirely.
“I’ve got you, sweetheart,” he said. “I’ve got you.”
She sobbed into his chest.
She loved him so much.
They had to survive this. They just had to.
CHAPTER 60
I WAS IN the takeout line at MacBain’s, crunching peanut shells underfoot while saying hey to various tipsy Hall of Justice regulars, but my eye was on the muted TV over the bar.
A report was coming in from an ABC affiliate in Alaska. Valerie Ricco, a reporter wearing a big green down coat, was standing on a remote stretch of coastline, trying to keep her footing as the wind whipped her hair and shook her microphone.
The captioning read: “This is day two of the hijackers’ takeover of the FinStar, a lavish passenger liner…”
Behind me were a couple of uniforms, drinking their lunch and talking to each other about Brady and how they heard there had been shootings.
I dropped my eyes from the TV and turning my body, faced the restaurant. I didn’t want to be recognized or questioned.
