When his foot neared the edge of the cliff, he paused and leaned forward, testing the ground. He had stepped over the chain barrier, and he wondered now if they kept people back because the cliff was crumbling.
The bay below was a brilliant aquamarine, the water so clear he could see the crazy quilt pattern of the grass growing on the sea floor. His mind flashed a picture of the cliff caving in and his body tumbling down the rock face leaving bloody bits of tissue and bone as he smashed against the black rock.
A hand grabbed his arm and he jumped back from the edge, nearly tripping on the low chain barrier. “Jesus, Pinky, what the fuck are you doing? You wanna get me killed?” He jerked his arm out of his brother’s grasp.
“Just wanted to know did you see something? They still there?”
“Gimme a minute.” Spyder pulled his tank top down over the several inches of boxer shorts that protruded above the belt line of his low-riding jeans. He inched back out to the edge and peered over.
The white sailboat was anchored so close to the base of the cliff he had to lean his body way out into space to see if it was still there. He spotted the mast and a bit of the white deck in the late afternoon shadows. The dark blue trawler was still out in the sunlight closer to the mouth of the bay.
“There she is. See, Bro,” he said. “I told you they was both still there. Come here and look.”
“I ain’t goin’ out there. I’ll take your word for it,” Pinky said.
Spyder hopped back over the loop of chain that hung between the short fence posts. “You better, Bro. You know I wouldn’t lie to you.” He draped an arm over his brother’s shoulder and thought about how he lied to his brother all the time, but what Pinky didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him.
Spyder stepped back and looked at his brother. He was wearing a bright orange baseball cap he found somewhere on the boat. The words “Bacardi Cup” were stitched across the front. Probably belonged to the old man they stole the boat from. He sure as hell didn’t need it anymore. Like the black binoculars that dangled from his brother’s neck. Pinky’s white frizzy hair stuck out on either side like a pair of fuzzy mouse ears, and he wore dirty white tennis shoes, white pants and a long-sleeved white shirt. The freak wanted to bring along a fucking umbrella to keep the sun off him, but Jesus, Spyder thought, that would have guaranteed everyone who saw them would remember them. He was working on what that Thor dude had talked about. That covert crap. Maybe they’d like hire him at the CIA or something and give him some cool weapons and shit.
“Let’s go,” Syder said, tipping his head towards the fort entrance.
Pinky pointed back over Spyder’s shoulder. “Look there.”
Spyder turned around. A big white megayacht had rounded the point and was easing her way into the bay.
“Fuckin’ rich people,” he said. “These islands are crawling with them.”
His brother raised the binoculars. The big white yacht began to turn a wide slow circle inside the bay. A small figure in a white crew member’s uniform appear out on the foredeck.
“They think cause they got money, their shit don’t stink,” Spyder continued. “Someday, when we get this gold, bro, boat like that won’t be nothing to us.”
When the bow of the boat pointed seaward, the yacht’s engines reversed and they began backing down.
Without lowering the binoculars, Pinky said, “The boat’s named Savannah Jane. I like that. Sounds classy. Better’n Fish n’ Chicks.”
By the entrance gate, a security guard pulled on a bell cord and the sound rang out. The fort closed at 5:00.
“Hell, Pinky. That ain’t nothing compared to the high class boat we gonna get.” Spyder grabbed his brother’s arm, forcing him to lower the glasses. “You wait and see. Come on. We gotta go. They’re closing.”
He steered Pinky back down the grassy hill toward the fort’s exit gate. The two of them had slipped through the gate with a large tour group so they didn’t have to pay the entrance fee, and he saw now that most of the groups were crowding out the narrow exit. He hoped they could slide along with the crowd right onto their bus so they wouldn’t have to hike all the way back down to the town. “Shit, I’m getting tired of all this waiting around,” he said as they edged into the crowd. “I wonder what the fuck is going on with the doc? He gonna come back and go after this submarine or not? We need to do something about our cash situation.”
“What cash situation?” Pinky asked.
“The we-ain’t-got-none situation,” Spyder said, motioning like one of the rappers he liked to wa
“Don’t go getting ideas, Spyder. That guy told us to wait here for him. Two days ain’t so long.”
“It’s too long to go with no cold beer and no pussy.” Spyder nudged his brother toward the crowd of tourists mobbed around the door to one of the buses. They were mostly older, chubby French tourists, but he spied a voluptuous, pouty teenaged girl trailing behind her parents. She wore a tight, low-cut tank top, and she was busting out of it. He worked his way through the crowd until he was right next to the girl, and then he turned sideways in front of her.
“Hey man,” he said to the big man on the other side of him – as though blaming him for pushing him – and he fell against her tits.
“Pardon,” she said, stepping back and glaring at him.
Spyder pretended to stumble again and fell against her for a second go, this time raising his hands to cushion his fall. He gave her tits a good squeeze.
“Sorry,” he said.
She was yelling some gibberish at him in French and her father started their way, so Spyder grabbed Pinky’s arm and yelled, “Come on!” They took off running down the steep road.
His damn brother sure as hell wasn’t any kind of athlete. He looked like an injured pelican as he waddled down the hill, his arms flapping like wings. Lucky for them, the parents were too busy drying the little cunt’s tears to take off after them. Probably decided against it since the day was too hot and they were too fat.
So, they didn’t get a ride down the hill, but it had been worth it. Once they rounded the first hair-pin switchback, he and his brother slowed to a walk and Spyder began to whistle “The Eddystone Light,” a tune he’d picked up one summer working on a shrimper.
From high up on the side of the hill, they had a great view looking down on the harbor. Spyder watched the ferry thread its way through the anchored boats. He hoped Thor was on it. Even if the dude was a total douchebag, it would cure this boredom to have something happen.
“That was a dumb move,” Pinky said between wheezing breaths.
Spyder rounded on his brother and grabbed a handful of fabric at the front of his shirt. “Fuck you, Pinky. You just wish you’d got a good feel like I did.” He cackled and released his brother. Then he rounded on him again and put his finger in his brother’s face. “And don’t you never call me dumb again.”
“You ain’t got no discipline, Spyder. That’s your problem. And we’re gonna need discipline if we ‘spect to take this Thor dude. He knows his shit. ‘Stead of sitting around drinking up the last of the liquor on the boat and coming up here to feel up some French chick, you and me need to be figuring our way out of this. It ain’t gonna be easy to kill a dude like Thor.”
CHAPTER SEVENTY-ONE
Aboard the Savannah Jane
March 29, 2008
6:35 p.m.
Riley sat sideways on the bench seat on the bow of the yacht Savannah Jane, leaning back on her elbows, her feet propped up on the cushion. The flight on Hazel’s private jet had taken four hours, with another hour spent dealing with the officials on both ends. Niko’s captain had arranged for a launch to ferry them out to the yacht. Riley had seen these big, white, multi-storied yachts that looked more like wedding cakes than boats, but she had never been aboard one. If Dig was keeping watch on the airport at Pointe-a-Pitre, as she assumed he was, he would never know they were already back down in the islands.
