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He closed his eyes a moment, feeling the fear, the panic, not knowing if she’d live.
Rafael said, “The boat will be here in a minute. There are two men, Captain Snelling and Aldo, his first mate. From what Captain Snelling tells me, carrying supplies is their main responsibility, otherwise, he says, they watch movies. He calls it a sabbatical from life.
“The way this works is that if Captain Snelling thinks something’s not right, their orders are to leave immediately. It’s good I have some supplies here. Here, help me with a couple of these boxes, so that’s all they’ll see.”
Nicholas and Rafael pushed two large boxes labeled RICE and COCONUT MILK in full view and he and Mike crouched down behind them.
Mike heard the boat’s engines, loud now and nearly to them. She risked a glance out the plane window. The boat was a cabin cruiser retrofitted to be a short-haul cargo ship.
The two men on the boat waved, and pulled up alongside the plane. The waves were making it hard to balance, and both she and Nicholas had to hang on or be thrown against the plane’s hull.
They anchored the boat, tied themselves to the float, and immediately Rafael started passing over boxes.
Nicholas said, “Now,” and they stood up, weapons drawn.
The two men on the boat had boxes in their hands. They froze.
“That’s right, don’t move, mates,” he called. “Keep holding the boxes.” Nicholas thought about announcing they were FBI, decided against it, at least for now.
Mike edged onto the float, careful to hold on to the edge of the door.
Rafael called out, “Relax, guys. They need to go to the island. They’re after their friends. They’re not going to hurt you. They’re FBI agents. That’s Captain Snelling and his first mate, Aldo.”
Captain Snelling was a bald, tall, buff Brit, with a red goatee. A red eyebrow went up. “No harm, eh? They’re pointing weapons at our heads. FBI? What’s this all about, Rafael?”
Nicholas said, “Captain Snelling, Aldo, we need to get to the island. We are FBI agents and the Kohaths captured two of our people. You ferried them in, so you know. I suggest you wait here with Rafael until we come back.”
Aldo grabbed the captain’s sleeve. “You know if we go back, even with their guns at our heads, they’ll kill us.”
Mike said, “They will not kill you. We’re going to shut down their operation. I strongly recommend you remain here with Rafael.”
Captain Snelling said, “No, Aldo, the old man wouldn’t kill us.”
Rafael said, “Maybe he wouldn’t, Captain, but those twins are here now. Both of them are mean as snakes, and twice as crazy.” He looked at Mike and Nicholas. “Don’t get me wrong, the old man is nuttier than a fruitcake, but he’s smart, and so long as you do your job well, he’s kind. But the twins, they’re not like him. They have something wrong, deep inside. Oh yes, they’d kill us in a flash.”
Mike asked, “The two prisoners with them, a man and a woman—what shape were they in? Drugged? Beaten?”
Captain Snelling said, “She wasn’t drugged, but she’d been knocked around. As for the man, he was still out of it. He could barely walk.
“Cassandra backhanded the woman for no reason I could see. I wanted to help her, but I knew the crazy witch would kill me without hesitation.”
Nicholas said, “As I said, we want to rescue them, shut down this operation. Will you let us do our job? Will you stay here with Rafael?”
Snelling looked from Aldo to Rafael, back toward the island and slowly nodded. “Everything is different now that the twins are here. They were manic, I could feel a sick sort of excitement rolling off them. Listen, I’m afraid for the old man.”
“We are, too,” Mike said. “We’ve already learned firsthand how ruthless the twins are. We’ll be back as soon as we can. How many other guards are there?”
“Four, all as vicious as the twins,” Aldo said. “Maybe more so. We keep away from them.”
Snelling said, “I know what you’re thinking. You’re wondering why we’re giving up so easily, that we’re going to screw you over. Not going to happen. I know those twins are here to do something really bad. I don’t know what it is, but they need to be stopped.”
Mike asked, “Do you know what Jason Kohath does here?”
“I haven’t got a clue, he’s always very close-mouthed, but he’s the smartest man I’ve ever met in my life. We occasionally play chess. I’m not bad, but he can look at the chessboard and I know he’s picturing twenty moves ahead with at least fifty possible variations. Once I was on his command center, that’s what I call it, anyway, and there was a bank of computer screens, mostly showing the world weather.” Snelling paused. “What he’s doing, it’s criminal, isn’t it?”
Nicholas said very deliberately, “If we don’t stop him, he will destroy the earth.”
Snelling clearly didn’t believe him. “Destroy the earth? What is he doing?”
