He rolled over and came up next to Kerry, taking the tiller from her. “Bastards.” He watched the boat draw away from them. “Ain’t catching them in this thing,” he said, whipping the watercraft around in a tight, vicious circle that nearly swamped the boat in the following waves.

“Dad, they’ve got Dar!” Kerry gasped out. “We’ve got to get her!”

“Ah know that.” Andrew said, setting a course back to the Dixie. “Ah know that.” He looked behind him, tension written clearly etched across his scarred features. “Mah God.”

Kerry could only sit there, clenching and unclenching her Terrors of the High Seas 315

hands, her heart beating so quickly she could barely breathe. Every instinct was pushing her toward simply jumping overboard and swimming after DeSalliers’ yacht; only the fragile remnants of her sanity kept her where she was.

Dar was gone. Helplessly, she started crying, one hand holding on to the boat and the other gripping her hair, wanting nothing else but to scream, and scream, and just keep on screaming.

“GO! MOVE! HURRY!”

Dar heard the noises and felt the motion, alarm sending a shock wave through her as she realized what had happened. She was lying on a hard surface inside the cabin of the boat, and she could feel rug under her fingertips as she started to move.

“Fucking bitch!”

Instinct made Dar roll out of the way, just as something whisked by her head and crunched into the fiberglass wall. She got to her hands and knees, trying to keep her balance as the boat pitched in the waves.

“Ow!” Gregos, who’d missed her and kicked the wall instead, hopped backwards and fell down, unused to the motion of the boat.

“Fucking bitch! Fucking bitch! Bitch!”

Dar shook her head to clear it and looked dazedly around at the cabin. DeSalliers appeared from the steps, staggering up them with an ice pack held to his face. He spotted Dar and stared at her. She stared back.

He dropped the ice and reached for a pool cue, the fury in his eyes showing he was beyond reason. Spittle flying from his bruised mouth, he went after Dar with the stick, swinging it at her head.

Dar really didn’t process what happened next. She knew she was being attacked and her body reacted, ducking under the pool cue and spinning around to land a kick on DeSalliers’ side.

“Bitch!”

“Let me do that, boss.” Gregos, face swollen from her earlier kick to his head, got up and grabbed for Dar. “I’ll break her fucking neck.” The boat lurched and he fell again. “Fuck!”

Dar got to the side of the room and collected herself, a pounding headache causing flashes of light to obscure her vision.

She put her back to the wall and raised her hands in a defensive posture, as DeSalliers held on to a chair while the boat pitched wildly.

“They’re comin’ after us!” a voice crackled from the radio.

“Holy shit!’

Unable to move, DeSalliers stared across the room at Dar. “I’m going to kill you,” he managed to get out. “I don’t care what it takes, if I hafta gut you with a fucking harpoon.”


316 Melissa Good Dar somehow managed to gather her wits. “What does that get you?” she asked, wincing at the rasp in her throat.

“Satisfaction,” he spat.

“A prison sentence,” Dar corrected. “Because they all know I’m here.”

DeSalliers looked through the window. “We’ll lose ’em. Then I’ll dump your stinking body overboard. They’ll never find it.”

Dar straightened a little. “You’ll never lose them.”

DeSalliers laughed and spat out a mouthful of blood. “Your fucking girlfriend? Bet she’s crying her eyes out.”

Did she have a chance to talk her way out of this? Dar swallowed. Well, at least she was alive, and she had to do everything she could to stay that way. “What is it you want, money?”

“No.” The man stared at her in utter hatred. “There ain’t enough to keep me from killing you. I’d even take a rap for it.”

Oh crap. Dar started looking for a way out of the cabin. The boat was traveling at high speed, and jumping off would probably kill her, but— Above the sound of the storm, she suddenly heard a booming roar.

“Boss!” the radio screamed. “They’re fucking shooting at us!”

DeSalliers grabbed the radio. “What? Get away from them, jackass!”

“I can’t! One of the god damned engines is blown!”

Another booming roar and suddenly the window beside DeSalliers dissolved into a thousand shards of glass, which went flying across the cabin. Dar pressed her body against the wall and threw her arm up to protect her face.

“Shit!” DeSalliers shoved off from the bar and bounced into Gregos, grabbing the gun from his henchman’s belt and heading in Dar’s direction.

SOMEWHERE BETWEEN GETTING on the Dixie and finding a way not to collapse, Kerry managed to get herself under control and put a screeching halt to her runaway panic. She staggered across the pitching back deck as Andrew threw himself at the ladder, yelling to a very scared-looking Charlie up top.

Bud was lying on the deck, still out cold. Bob was clinging to the railing, his eyes as huge as baseballs. “Oh my God,” he was saying, over and over again. “Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God.”

“Please shut up.” Kerry went past him and into the cabin, her knees barely holding her as she made it to the bench seats and yanked them up. She grabbed the shotgun case and pulled it out, her hands shaking. Can I even load it? With impatient fingers, Kerry Terrors of the High Seas 317

shoved shells into place and worked the pump action. Then she stood up and headed for the door, grabbing the frame as the Dixie heeled over and picked up speed. She went outside, stopping short as she almost plowed into Andrew.

He looked at her, his eyes flicking to the shotgun. “Ya’ll wanna give me that there thing?”

“No,” Kerry answered hoarsely. “I know how to shoot it.”

The boat bounced over the waves, the spray drenching both of them. “Figured you did,” Andrew replied. “But Ah figure Ah got more practice at it.” He held out a hand. “And Ah know what part of that boat to hit.”

Kerry handed the rifle over without another word. She followed him as he went to the side rail and got up onto the edging, then moved around to the bow of the boat. The storm almost obscured the DeSalliers’ boat, but Kerry could see it crashing through the waves ahead of them, and she hung on to the side cleats with both hands as she squinted into the rain.

Andrew went to the front rail and knelt on the deck, curling one arm around the metal and propping up the shotgun with his other.

DeSalliers’ boat was much faster than theirs, Kerry suddenly remembered. “Dad! They can outrun us!” she yelled as loud as she could.

“Naw,” Andrew yelled back. “Ripped the fuel line out of one of them engines.” He glanced behind him with a tense, rakish expression. “Jest in case.”

Kerry crawled up behind him and held on to the rail, willing the Dixie to go faster. Her insides were tied in knots, and she realized then, just kneeling there, that she had no idea if Dar was even alive. A soft sound emerged from her throat and she gripped the rails with both hands. “Oh, God…please, please,” she begged in a whisper. “Please don’t take her from me.”

She wasn’t sure if Andrew heard her, but when she looked up again, he was looking back at her, those quiet, gentle blue eyes so very much like Dar’s visible in the light from the Dixie’s windows.

“S’gonna be all right, Kerry,” Andrew told her. “We’re gonna get them.”

Kerry felt tears welling up again. “I don’t want to lose her,” she managed to get out. “I can’t.”

The big man gazed back at her with compassion and understanding. “Me neither, sweetheart. Only kid Ah got.” He turned back around and threw the gun to his shoulder, sighting down the barrel and squeezing the trigger in a move just that fast.

The gun discharged, hitting DeSalliers’ yacht just above the waterline. It swerved, and in the light from the cabin he saw a silhouette, one he recognized. He pumped a shell into the chamber 318 Melissa Good and shot again, blowing out the window. “Step closer, you piece of meat,” he muttered under his breath. “Hope them fish are hungry.”

DAR WATCHED THE muzzle of the gun as DeSalliers pointed it directly at her. She was out of room to run, and the door was on the other side of the cabin. Trapped. Fuck.

“Take this.” DeSalliers threw the radio mic at her. “Tell them to fucking back off, or I’m going to blow your fucking head off.”

Dar caught the mic by reflex and held it, her finger brushing the button.

“Tell them!” DeSalliers screamed. He pointed the gun at her head, balancing himself against the wall with his other hand as the boat pitched in the waves. “Now!”

In that moment, Dar understood that she was likely to die. She didn’t believe for one second that DeSalliers would hesitate to shoot her if she called off the Dixie, and frankly, she didn’t believe for one second her father and her partner would stop, even if she asked them to. So. Dar wondered what it would feel like, and hoped it would be fast. Then she reserved the pain in her heart for missing Kerry, and how sorry she’d be to leave her. God, how much that hurt.

“Tell them!”

The pain echoed through her. Dar whipped the mic back at him. “Fuck you,” she yelled back. “I ain’t telling them shit! I hope they run right over this piece of crap, with you in it!”

DeSalliers ducked the mic and thrust the gun toward her, squeezing the trigger with a ghastly grimace.

Dar flinched reflexively, and brought her hand up in a futile attempt to protect her face, closing her eyes as she waited for the pistol to fire.

Click.

Dar stared past her hand at DeSalliers. He squeezed the trigger again.

Click.

Dar jumped forward and grabbed the gun, wrestling it from his grasp. “Stupid asshole.” She threw the gun from her with as much force as she could. “I’m gonna kick your stinking ass.”

He stumbled backwards but she was on him now, pouncing like a cat and grabbing him by the lapels. Kerry had done damage to his face, but Dar wasn’t interested in disfiguring him. She went for his throat, her hands closing on it as she let out a roar of anger and dug for his windpipe.

“Aough!” DeSalliers grabbed at her hands, kicking her in the knees as he tried to get away. “Help!”

Dar kept her grip as the boat pitched wildly and they fell Terrors of the High Seas 319

against the wall, her shoulder smashing against the window painfully. She saw Gregos trying to get to his feet, but she kept on squeezing DeSalliers, hearing the gagging noises her adversary was making.

“Hang on, boss!” The bodyguard grabbed a chair and threw it at Dar.

As she sensed the motion, Dar turned them both and the chair slammed into DeSalliers’ back. He screamed, best he could with his throat being compressed, and fell heavily against Dar.

She twisted and tried to keep her feet, but just then the boat leaned over radically, and she found herself, DeSalliers, and the guard all falling through the air and smashing against the huge window on the far side of the cabin. When it shattered, Dar felt the surface drop out from under them and then she smelled the sea and diesel, and thought she heard screaming.

Maybe it was her.

“THEY’RE SLOWING DOWN!” Charlie yelled from the bridge.

“Taking on water!”

“Bet your ass,” Andy yelled back. “Get this damn thing nose up to the back of that damn thing!” He put down the shotgun and pulled a large automatic from the pack at his belt, standing up and holding the railing as they closed in. “Teach them bastards to mess with mah kid.”

Kerry could see men running around over on the yacht, and two came up on deck, yelling in alarm as they spotted the Dixie.

She strained her eyes, searching for Dar’s figure among all the shadows and willing it to appear. Praying for it. Begging a God she’d lately wondered about for this one small favor. This one little thing, in the cosmic sense. This one life. “Please.”

The bow swung closer and Andrew got ready to jump from one ship to the other, his body coiled in waiting, the gun held in ready position as he prepared to attack.

As the two vessels converged, the bigger one suddenly heeled over, listing toward them as a muffled explosion sounded deep within. Just as Andrew was about to leap, the windows in the cabin shattered from the inside and bodies came flying out, hitting the water as the boat listed onto its side and came perilously close to capsizing.