Rebel Island (Tres Navarre #7)(71)

His eyes were steely, but I doubted I could make him lose his cool. Jose was not the type. He wanted to be the master, the timer. He would kill in his own way.

“People die,” Jose said. “My children died before my eyes. Why should other lives matter to me? Why should I not choose the time and the way? I’m good at it.”

“But you made mistakes.”

He shrugged. “That’s over now. I will not make any deals. I will not apologize.”

“Jose,” Imelda said.

“You will stay with me,” he told her, “as you promised. I will take care of you. It will be all right.”

“No, it won’t,” I said. “This boathouse is a dead end, Jose.”

Then he surprised me. He did another calculation, came to a decision I didn’t anticipate.

He took out a gun—the same .38, I imagined, that had killed Jesse Longoria—and he aimed it at my chest.

42

Maia tried to stay put, but it wasn’t something she did well.

She couldn’t shake the feeling that Imelda had been trying to tell her something earlier. She told herself it didn’t matter now. Help had arrived. They would head home and Maia would never see this place again. Tres would be right back, with good news or bad. The worst was over.

But it was hard to believe that. Maia had a tingling feeling between her shoulder blades that usually meant something was wrong. The far end of the island was hidden behind the rubble of the hotel and clouds of smoke. She knew Tres had gone to the boathouse, but she’d never seen it and didn’t know exactly how far it was.

Damn him for running off. He was in worse shape than she was, for God’s sake.

A shadow fell over her. “You sure I can’t get you anything, ma’am?”

It was one of the coast guardsmen. He reminded her of Chris Stowall—young, blond, a little nervous. Then she remembered Chris Stowall was burned to ashes inside the hotel.

“Could you help me up?” she asked.

He looked a little flustered, but he took her hand and helped her to her feet. It was difficult to do this with dignity. She felt as if she was carrying a bowling ball around her middle, but she did her best.

“I’m going for a walk,” she announced. “Over that way.”

The guardsman frowned. “You sure that’s a good idea?”

“No,” Maia answered. “It’s probably not.”

And she began walking toward the boathouse.

43

“No,” Imelda said.

Jose hesitated. I hoped he was having second thoughts. It’s a different thing, killing a man while you’re looking him in the eyes.

On the other hand, Jose had shot Jesse Longoria in the chest. He’d bludgeoned Chris Stowall to death and stuffed his body in a freezer. I doubted my boyish charm was going to keep him from pulling the trigger.

“They’ll hear the shot,” I said, trying to sound reasonable. “They’ll find me dead and know you killed me. You can’t cover that up.”

I could tell his mind was chewing on that, coming up with solutions. I didn’t want to give him time.

“Imelda,” I said, “do you want to stay with him?”

“Of course.” No hesitation, but her voice was full of despair, as if I were asking her whether she’d like to walk on the moon.

“Tell him,” I said. “His only chance is surrender.”

The doors of the boathouse slapped shut and creaked open with a gust of wind. A curl of seawater sloshed over the concrete and doused my shoes.

“You’ll go in the water,” Jose decided. “Get in.”

“No, Jose,” I said. “It’s over. No more planning. No more hits.”

“Your body will be underwater,” he said. “Under the boat. They’ll find it eventually, but not for a while. We’ll be gone by then.”

Imelda was shivering. I needed her help. She was the only possible leverage I could use to make Jose change his mind. But I also couldn’t wait for her. I was out of options. I was weighing the odds of attacking when the worst possible variable got added to the equation.

The boathouse door opened and Maia walked in.

“Ah,” she said. “I caught you at a bad time.”

I locked eyes with her and I told her silently to go.

Not surprisingly, she did the exact opposite. She came to stand next to me and took my hand. “I got worried.”

“Señora.” Imelda’s voice trembled. “You shouldn’t be on your feet…”

Her voice trailed off. I suppose she realized the futility of what she was saying, given the fact that her husband was planning to put a bullet in me.

As for Jose, he looked like a juggler who’d been thrown too many plates. His forehead beaded with sweat.

“Hello, Jose,” Maia said. “Do you mind if I sit down?”

She didn’t wait for him to answer. She pulled up an empty ice chest and sat down as best she could, holding my hand for support.

I was beyond worried. I was ready to unzip my own skin and run screaming into the sand dunes. I wanted, by sheer force of will, to make Jose and his gun disappear off the face of the earth.

“You remember when Imelda was pregnant?” Maia asked him. We might’ve been at a dinner among friends. Her tone was maddeningly casual.