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He answered on the second ring.
“Browning.”
“It’s me. Get a fix on this location. Someone is inbound. ETA four minutes. And the last thing I heard was “Take no prisoners.” I think our link to the pirates is the crew. Whoever is providing crews for these yacht owners has to be in on the thefts and murders. There’s a speedboat anchored just off the starboard bow. I’m going to try and get to it before this all goes to hell. Get somebody here ASAP. I can’t die looking like this. My hair’s a mess.”
Browning grinned. Caldwell’s wild red curls were as unforgettable as she was. “Roger that.”
Rusty grabbed her jacket, stuffed the phone into an inner pocket and zipped it in, then palmed her Glock, pocketed two fifteen-round magazines, and bolted out of the cabin, locking it behind her. If they thought someone was locked inside, the time it took for them to shoot their way in might be the difference between her life and death.
And then she began hearing a lot of shouting and screaming, and gunshots coming from above.
Shit! They were already onboard.
Now she had a decision to make. She was on the lowest level of the yacht and needed to get up to the main deck to escape.
There were two staircases, one at each end of the galley level, that led to the upper decks. She needed to know how many intruders had boarded and where their boat was—and pray to God they hadn’t already taken possession of the speedboat. If they had, she was going to fight them for it.
She paused for a moment, her heart pounding as she listened.
One man was ordering Rodini and the others to move to the edge of the deck. There was more screaming and crying, and Rodini was telling them how rich he was and how they could ransom him for money, when Rusty pivoted and ran the other way.
She could hear men coming down the stairs behind her, but she kept running toward the opposite staircase and then up and out into the sunlight.
The pirates had lashed their boat to the opposite side of the yacht from where she was standing. That gave her the fighting chance she needed as she began to sprint toward the speedboat. And with every step, she kept hearing screaming and begging from the other end of the deck, and with every shot, a splash ensued. She was only seconds away from escape when she heard shouts. They’d seen her, and she’d just run out of deck!
Without a second of hesitation, she leaped. Only after she was in midair and looking down did she realize she was going in the water.
Then fate handed her a miracle.
A wave hit the speedboat, rocking it back against the yacht just as she came down. She landed in the boat on her hands and knees, popping her neck and biting her tongue from the jolt of the fall. Her body was one solid ache, and she was spitting blood, but there was no time to think about what she may have done to herself.
She scrambled to her feet, threw off the rope securing the speedboat to the yacht, and ran for the controls. Rodini had insisted on keeping the key in the ignition after someone misplaced it onboard days earlier. She had been counting on it being there. And it was.
She slid into the seat and turned the key. The engine fired at the same time the first bullet sailed past her head. There was no time for an engine warm-up as she grabbed her gun and turned, firing off a round of shots at the same time she pushed the throttle forward.
The sudden burst of power lifted the nose of the speedboat so high out of the water that for a moment Rusty thought it was going to flip over, but then it came down with a thud and she was flying, leaving a four-foot wave of water in her wake.
They were shooting at her again, the bullets zinging past her like a swarm of angry bees. She turned sideways, making herself a smaller target, and began firing back at the armed men lined up on the deck. She saw some of them fall and others ducking for cover, but she knew their faces. The men shooting at her were part of the crew. Her suspicions had been correct.
She emptied the first clip and shoved in a second clip before moving out of range. Even though she’d taken three of them out and wounded a couple of others, the fight was far from over. The pirates had the yacht, and their boat, and they didn’t leave witnesses.
Rusty turned back to the stretch of water before her to get her bearings. They’d dropped anchor at Big Key. The sun was at her back, so she was moving west. Club Key was the small island to her right, which meant the Florida coast should be somewhere ahead.
She pulled the sat phone from her bag and made one more call, with salt spray in her face and the roar of the engine in her ears.
Again, Browning answered. “Backup is on the way, and we’ve got someone in a speedboat on radar.”
“That’s me. Don’t shoot. I made it off the yacht, but I’m going to have company ASAP.”
“Copy that. Choppers in the air and closing in. Less than two minutes out. Are you hurt?”
“Not so it shows,” Rusty said, and then glanced over her shoulder. “They’re coming after me. Can’t talk now. My daddy always told me to keep both hands on the wheel.”
She dropped the phone back in her bag. The speedboat was hitting the tops of the waves so hard it kept bouncing her out of the seat. There was a life jacket at her feet, and she needed to be wearing it, but the best she could do was get her foot between the straps. Maybe if she went into the water, it would go with her.
The wind was burning her eyes and tearing at her hair, but she didn’t look behind her again. She was focused on the faint green shoreline of the Everglades ahead of her when the image of a man’s face flashed before her.
Soldier Boy! That shocked her and then scared her. Was this her life actually flashing before her eyes? Was this some celestial sign that she wasn’t getting out of this alive?
