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That was all I needed. I leaped on his partner from my perch five feet above. He was straightening and turning, having heard the gun drop to the deck. I landed on his back and brought him smashing face-first into the hard hull of the boat. Blood squirted from a broken nose. But he didn’t move.
Bill moved, though. He had recovered from the whack with the pole. He jumped onto my back and got a chokehold on me.
I drove backward hard with both elbows and felt the right one connect. Bill gave a very satisfying grunt of pain, but he did not let go.
I stood. He clung to me, increasing the pressure on my throat. I was starting to feel it. The world was growing slowly dark and I knew I didn’t have much longer before I blacked out.
With my last strength I lunged backwards, smashing Bill’s back into the guide’s platform.
He gave a kind of crushed gasp and slid off my back.
I managed a deep breath and turned to him. He was lying on the deck, momentarily stunned. I leaned over him, doubling my fists together, and whacked his chin with everything I had in a double haymaker.
Bill’s eyes closed.
I turned. Bob hadn’t moved. His breathing was regular but shallow. His breath bubbled through the smashed nose.
I took a hank of steel leader from my tackle box and wired their wrists and ankles together. While I worked I thought as hard and as fast as I could.
Doyle was on the sailboat. At any moment he might notice that the wrong guy was still standing. I didn’t know how many others might be on the boat with him.
The smart thing to do would be to radio the Coast Guard—but wait. Doyle could overhear on his radio. So what I should do is get away from Doyle and his boat as quickly as possible, and then use the radio. With my superior speed I could easily keep him in sight and outrun the sailboat long enough for help to arrive.
Mind made up and visitors safely wired to their seat, I stepped to the controls and started the engine.
I could see some movement on the deck of the sailboat now. For once, I was just in time. I steered for the channel and opened the throttle wide, putting distance between me and the sailboat.
Over the roar of the engine I heard a flat crack, then three more in rapid succession. They were closely followed by four solid-sounding ka-thunk! sounds. The engine coughed, lurched, and stopped.
My engine was trailing four neat plumes of smoke. The boat glided to a stop.
I looked back at the sailboat. About one hundred yards away, it lay still in the water, anchor line taut off the bow.
Even from this distance there was no way to mistake Doyle. He stood beside the mast, rifle cradled casually in his arm. He turned his head and said something, and a moment later an inflatable boat came around from the far side of the sailboat and headed at me.
Three men sat in the boat. One held a hand on the steering arm of a small outboard. The other two, carrying what looked like assault rifles, sat in front of him.
I picked up the Glock from where it lay on the deck. I think I had some idea about sinking the inflatable. But as I raised the pistol there was another sharp crack and the control panel beside me exploded.
I looked at Doyle. He was sighting down the barrel of his rifle. I could feel the crosshairs centered on my chest. I got the idea: he was a very good shot. I put down the gun and waited for the dinghy.
It didn’t take long for the inflatable to reach my wounded skiff. One of the storm troopers was crouching in the bow and leaped onto my boat, his aim never wavering from my midsection.
He moved his head in a very fast glance at Bill and Bob, then locked his stare back on me. “Carl,” he said, and the other trooper climbed aboard.
“Shit,” the second one said. “I told him Otto would fuck it up.”
“Tie his hands,” the leader said. Carl found the wire leader in my tackle box and did a very good job tying my hands. I could feel them turning blue.
“Untie those two,” the first man said. He gave a slight nod of his head at the two clowns I had wired to the seat.
“Fuck-ups,” Carl said. But he knelt and twisted the wires off. When he was done he looked up at the first man and said, “Okay.”
“Stay with them,” he was told. “Move this boat over to the Battle.”
“The Battle?” So that was the name of Doyle’s other sailboat. “Wouldn’t the Retreat be more like it?” He ignored me.
“How about the White Flight?” I asked him.
