
This is a work of fiction. The events and characters described herein are imaginary and are not intended to refer to specific places or living persons. The opinions expressed in this manuscript are solely the opinions of the author and do not represent the opinions or thoughts of the publisher.
Demon KeyAll Rights Reserved.Copyright © 2008 David BrookoverV2.1
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PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
To my mom, Dorothy
And to my motherin-law,
Rosemary
For their loving support.
Table of Contents
The fierce tropical storm battered the dilapidated shopping strip, ripping away roofing shingles and toppling storefront signs. Elaine Brewster leaned into the squall behind Coen's Deli in Coral Springs, Florida, hurriedly locked the three deadbolts on the warped door, and armed the alarm pad. The small canopy above the back door provided little shelter from the horizontal rain, and her clothes were instantly drenched. Her chickenshit boss had flown the coop hours ago to secure his home against the powerful storm's onslaught, leaving her to lock up after dark -- alone.
She turned and squinted through the silvery-black veil at the spot where her battered Neon was parked across the alley, but the naked light bulb above the door failed to illuminate it. She prayed it was still there. She scanned the immediate area for car lights and people, but all the neighboring businesses had closed hours ago and sat silent like ominous hulks.
Elaine shivered. The deluge came in horrific stinging waves that soaked her to the bone. The blustery winds only heightened her distress.
A wicked web of horizontal lightning temporarily dispersed the blackness like a crackling neon sign. Thunder shuddered the cracked concrete stoop beneath her feet. Elaine hugged her ample bosom as she waited for a lull in the rain, but it only seemed to get worse. Blowing watery sheets washed away the thin gravel layer of the potholed alley and swelled the bloated sandy rivulets into mini-whitewater rapids.
The dim light winked above her. Jesus, now the damn power was threatening to go caput! She inhaled deeply. Anxiously. Weighing more than three hundred pounds, Elaine was fully aware that she wasn't about to dodge many raindrops as she made a mad dash for her Neon. But really, what difference did it make? Her clothes were now dead water weight. She felt like a drowned rat.
A sudden image of an imagined drowned rat was quickly displaced by a chilling death mask. What if she wasn't alone in the alley? Paranoia rattled her nerves. Her car was camouflaged in the impenetrable blackness, a perfect place for a murderous carjacker's ambush. Her breathing came in wheezing gasps as her trembling hand rummaged through her purse for the pepper spray. Her damp chubby fingers located it, but they had trouble grasping the small canister.
Finally, she triumphantly hoisted the weapon in front of her face, but then another concern materialized. What if the pepper spray didn't work out in the rain and wind? She gripped the canister close to her heaving chest. God, she was a mess. Worrying about goddammed carjackers on a night like this. What a stupid fool she was. She released a mirthless chortle and wiped her rain-slick pumpkin face.
A strong gust fluttered her badly stained apron. The heavy fabric flogged the numerous fleshy folds of her hips and tightened the wet knot at her spine. God, she thought, it was now or never. Carjackers be damned!
Elaine stepped into the maelstrom and waded across the burbling current that raced along the alley. It was surprisingly deep and tugged fiercely at her knees. The torrent nearly toppled her.
"Thank you, Lord!" she shouted, after safely reaching the parking lot.
The Neon's crumpled rear bumper reflected the next horizon-to-horizon lightning display, and Elaine was tempted to hug the old road warrior. Instead, she fished the car keys from her apron pocket and turned the lock. She was about to give the slippery door handle a tug, when she felt a wasp-like prick on the back of her neck. Flying wasps in this storm? Most likely it was a harmless piece of flying debris the television alarmists were always warning viewers about during a tropical storm or hurricane.
As Elaine's fingers probed the source of the itchy pain, her thick legs grew rubbery and dull. Her purse slipped from her suddenly numb fingers and splashed into the rising puddle at her feet. She dropped heavily to her knees, but felt little of the slicing pain from the sharp gravel that skinned her kneecaps. Her obese form rolled over, and she lay there, seeing but not feeling. Her muscles refused her commands, including her disabled eyelids that failed to blink away the pelting raindrops.
The puddle at her feet spread and joined others; they rapidly formed a surging pond. Gusting ripples lapped at her lips like ocean surf, with some sweeping into her gaping mouth. Terror seized her thoughts. Was she having a stroke? Why didn't her muscles work and her brain did? Was she about to die a lonely death behind those dumpy stores?
Elaine attempted to calm herself, but that was futile. She was scared shitless!
She was going to drown, and there wasn't a damn thing she could do to prevent it.
Suddenly, she sensed she was being moved -- up and up -- then the world bounced a few times. The turbulent sky and downpour vanished, and she was alone in dry blackness. Who had moved her? And why? This didn't look like the inside of any ambulance she'd ever seen!
There was a sudden loud roar. Elaine recognized the sound of a diesel engine starting up. Moments later, the crumpled sky above her began flapping wildly -- she guessed it was a tarp. Since when did ambulances begin blanketing their patients with tarps? Then a crazy notion escalated her panic. Maybe she was riding inside a hearse!
Elaine tried with all her might to force her eyelids down to ease the rising motion sickness that had partnered with her panic, but again, the damn things refused to budge.
All of a sudden, it hit her.
She wasn't inside an ambulance or hearse.
She was riding in the back of a pick-up truck. Elaine mentally frowned.
For godsake, why?
The rain hammered the fluttering tarp inches above Elaine Brewster's face and suppressed the pick-up's throaty growl. Even the thunderclaps were muted rumbles. She had no concept of time in her comatose state. Unseen hands slid her from the pickup's sheltered bed into the raging storm. That enigmatic someone dragged her by her armpits through tall windbent grass, as quarter-size raindrops stung her eyes and brilliant flashes temporarily erased her vision. And, her eyelids still refused to shut.
A flashlight clicked on, and Elaine passed through a wide threshold. She was roughly hauled into what appeared to be a boathouse. The ceiling was festooned with mammoth spider webs resembling a road map of downtown Miami, and dark rotting timbers supported a sagging roof that leaked rain like a sprinkling can. Suddenly, she found herself rolling sideways into what she recognized as an airboat. When she came to a bone-jarring stop below the fan motor, the doors at the opposite end of the boathouse slid open, and Elaine watched powerlessly as someone poled the boat out of its shelter.
Her captor -- she finally acknowledged that she was being kidnapped -- was a mountain of a man dressed in a black rain slicker with the glistening hood tied close to his face. A slight paunch puckered the material around each metal snap, but he was in decent shape. His powerful hands easily drove the pole into the water's bottom and pulled it free of the sucking muck for another push.
Elaine couldn't see his face -- he stood with his back to her -- but she didn't have to see it. He was an evil man, just like the ones Reverend Peters preached about during his weekly sermons. A disciple of Satan. A soulless stranger without a conscience, and without regard for human life.
Panic seized her thoughts again. Whatever drug the monster had used to rend her completely helpless had left her conscious. Cruelly conscious. Sadistically conscious. She wanted to scream, claw his eyes out, and use his drug on him to see how he liked it! Instead, she subdued her rage and fervently prayed that he wouldn't rape and torture her. Make her death fast. Make it clean. Please God! Please!
The man slipped ear protectors over his hood and pressed them tight against his unseen ears. The airboat's fan engine coughed to life, and its roar was deafening. She was thankful that she was unable to feel the agony from her nearly blown eardrums.
The airboat rocked and sailed in the strong gusts, and for a while Elaine didn't think they'd make it to wherever they were headed. But then again, what did she care? Drowning in a swamp was probably a more merciful fate than what her captor had in store for her.
The fan engine chuffed and sputtered to silence. Her captor beached and moored the airboat before rolling her into the shallow water with a hefty splash. The man grabbed her armpits again and dragged her out of the choking water and through more grass. Her left eye was battered blind from the storm, and the vision in her right eye was reduced to gray shadows. And still, she couldn't feel a thing.
The rain abruptly ceased. Elaine was inside again, but where? She had the vague sensation of rising, and then was jolted flat on her back; her head bounced like a deflated basketball. A bed? A table? She wanted to shudder, but her muscles remained useless.
Elaine was totally blind now. A defenseless piece of meat on a slab, ready for manipulation. Or was it to be mutilation? She shivered inside a dark isolated room inside her mind. Maybe it was better that way. She didn't really want to see what the bastard was going to do to her. Her blindness was probably a blessing, although a damn small one. A real blessing would be her boss, Mike Cohen, lying here instead of her. The rat-bastard.
Vague shadows reappeared -- first in the right eye, and then in the left. Gradually her focus returned. Then, like a miracle, her eyelids blinked. Blinked! Halleluiah! Hell's bells and hairy Mary! They friggin' worked again!
Her captor was bent over her holding a small vial of eye drops and watching her intently. His face was concealed below his dark eyes by a blue surgical mask; wiry tufts of a gray-black beard curled at the bottom edge of the blue fabric. She was in some kind of enormous outbuilding -- maybe a barn. The windows were painted black, and crudely installed florescent tubes dangled from exposed electrical wiring stapled to the overhead loft. Their yellowish glow burned her eyes. She felt it! This time she was able to close her lids and block the tortuous light.
Elaine cracked her lids open and warily peeked out again. The monstrous man had exchanged the vial for a pruning shears and proceeded to cut her sopping clothes away. Her horrified eyes bulged from their sockets! She now lay completely naked below the stranger's gaze! She wanted to scream, but that was still an impossibility.
Her captor moved out of her sight for an instant, and when he returned, he ominously waved a shiny scalpel back and forth above her face. His mask puffed in and out as he laughed.
"This is one weight loss spa where you will lose weight, honey. Lots of it!" His voice was muted gravel behind the mask, but Elaine understood him just fine. She cringed in the corner of her remote mental room.
The big man stretched her flabby arms above her head, and folds of loose fat pressed against her cheeks. He shuffled two steps down along her body and leaned over her midsection. He appeared very intent on what he was doing.
Elaine squeezed her eyes shut again. She didn't want to witness any more. He was wielding his horrid scalpel, and that suggested that he was operating on her. She didn't even want to venture a guess about the procedure.
Lose weight, he'd told her.
Shut up! She shouted at her curiosity! Give it a rest. I don't need to know what he's doing. As long as I can't feel it or see it, I'll let it go. What other choice do I have?
Suddenly, her captor rolled her eyelids back with wooden matchsticks. He straightened when her lids were firmly locked into place, and Elaine found herself back at square one. She was again helpless to block out the sight of the coming horrors. So much for her miracle.
The tall man turned away to retrieve something beyond her vision. When he pivoted toward her, he held up a thick rectangular piece of bloody cloth; its dimensions looked to be about a foot-and-half by a foot. She strained her eyes and examined it closer, and then mentally screamed for all she was worth!
It wasn't a bloody cloth at all. It was a slice of her own flesh!
Dexter Lowe yawned in his office. He hadn't managed more than a catnap during the past thirty-six hours. As the police chief of Gator Creek, Florida, a blink-and-you'll-miss-it Everglades town west of Fort Lauderdale, he was accustomed to the long hours during tropical storms and hurricanes; it was just that his fifty-year old body didn't hold up like it did twenty years ago. Panicked callers bombarded the local 911 lines, reporting everything from stranded cats to fallen trees toppling power lines. He passed the buck to the fire department and Florida Power and Light whenever he could, but nevertheless his lone police officer cruised the vicinity to checkout reported damage and respond to life-threatening situations.
Lowe's thinning auburn hair was mixed with gray brushstrokes, and sun-brown furrows plowed across his forehead. Radiant creases crinkled at the corners of his mouth and mahogany eyes, and his square face was chiseled tan stoic. He studied the computer printout displaying NOAA's latest storm properties and projections and massaged his bloodshot eyes. The stubborn storm was stalled over the Everglades, and they had to persevere another six hours until it popped over to Fort Meyers and the Gulf of Mexico.
But that was the least of his worries at the moment. A two-legged storm was marching toward his office.
A petite woman in her early thirties opened his wood and glass door and poked her head inside. Her name was Teddi McCoy, and she was FBI. Nosy, nagging FBI.
"Hey, Dex, I thought this was the Sunshine State," she remarked wryly. "It hasn't stopped raining since I got here."
"That ought to tell you something," he retorted. "It might follow you back to Washington."
Teddi shot him a withering glance. "Very funny."
"Add two weeks to the one you've been here, and we've got ourselves an atypical monsoon season," he replied. "Along with an ark load of headaches."
"Me included?"
He merely sighed and stared out the front window. It was still dark outside. The sun had set weeks ago beneath a woolen blanket of clouds.
Dex considered Teddi a pretty woman, despite the all-business scowl planted on her face 24-7. Short honey blond hair framed her oval face, which was pushed behind her ears. No earrings. No make-up, for that matter. But still, the rose blush on her cheekbones and the naturally long lashes highlighted an eye-pleasing, sculptured face. Her 5'4" figure was filled out in all the right places and in good physical shape, and her green almond eyes regarded him quizzically.
"Something wrong?" she asked.
He put down the printout and cleared his throat. "Yeah. Just about everything."
She exhaled relief. "You referring to the tropical storm?"
"And this damn missin' person's case. I can't help thinkin' that when this storm passes, we'll have another one or two people missin'."
"Funny how all the people snatched have been local."
"Yeah. I'm laughin' my ass off."
"That's not what I meant," she snapped.
"I know. I'm tired and pissed-off at the moment, and that's a mighty unfriendly combination. Sorry for the wisecrack."
"No sweat. I'm a bit bushed myself."
"Any leads from your DC boys?"
Teddi plunked down in the worn leather chair beside his desk. "Zip. Nadda. Zero. SSDD."
He frowned and scratched the side of his head.
"Same shit, different day, Dex."
"Oh yeah. Right. Told you I was wiped out."
She tapped her short, neatly trimmed fingernails on his oak desk. "I keep thinking we've missed something, but for the life of me, I can't figure out what that might be."
"So you think it might help if we review the facts again for the umpteenth time?" Dex offered.
She chuckled. "Pretty desperate, huh?"
He enjoyed her company -- except for her occasional newly-divorced, I-don't-trust-men attitude. It was obvious that she was still bitter, and her emotional wounds were slow to heal.
It was past six in the evening, and they were the only ones left in the police station. The silence was occasionally disrupted by blustery storm gusts rattling the shutters and by tree branches tickling the office windows. Even though he was a calloused old lawman, those sounds gave him the creeps. Something surreal had invaded Gator Creek and kept his nerves on edge.
Dex leaned forward and planted his elbows on the desk. "Desperate ain't the word for it, Teddi. I'm contemplatin' knockin' my noggin against the wall."
"Glad I could save your wall from a beating, Dex." Teddi opened the accordion folder on her lap and shuffled through the thick sheaf of papers. "So many reports and no damn substance. Nothing we can use."
"That's the government for you," he muttered. "Paper peddlers."
She scowled. "Hey, I'm just doing my job."
"And look where it's gotten us so far."
She leaned back and managed an exhausted grin. "You've got me there."
"Four abductions in three weeks," Dex stated, his sour stomach splashing more acid into his esophagus. He burped. "Sorry."
"Bad stomach?"
"Bad month."
"Yeah. Join the crowd. My divorce was final a month ago."
"Did you love him?"
"At the end?"
"Hell, ever!"
"No. Well, kinda. Before he morphed into an impossible asshole."
"Got that off your chest now?"
She glowered at him. "Yes," she replied stiffly.
"Good. Can we forget that pain-in-your-ass for a few minutes and concentrate on the business at hand?"
"That was blunt." Her voice was ice.
"Got to be. We've got our backs up against the wall here, Teddi. Those women might still be alive, and time is a tickin'. I'd prefer to find them alive."
She mellowed some. "So let's have another go at it."
"Thank you."
"I guess you think I'm being foolish."
"You mean totin' all your personal baggage with you on this investigation?"
"Well, yes. I guess that's what I mean."
"Then I sure as hell think you're foolish."
"Thanks for your brutal honesty." She sighed. "Let's get on with this."
Dex leaned back in his chair and propped his feet on the edge of his cluttered desk. "All right now, let's reassess our current position. We've got no friggin' clues. No motives. No kidnappin' ransom demands. No crime precedent in this peaceful neck of the woods. Did I miss anything?"
"Yeah. The victims are all overweight women. Other than that, they have nothing in common. Different demographics all together. Social. Economic. You name it."
"And they were snatched in small shopping strips at night. Unlighted and no surveillance cameras. Our perp is shy, wouldn't you agree?"
Teddi smiled in spite of her sour mood. "A great psych profile."
His brows arched. "You mean psycho profile, don't you?"
She leaned forward. "Like me?"
They laughed with no attempt at holding back. It momentarily allayed their tension. Stress. Frustration. Bitterness.
A booming explosion outside Dex's office rocked the station and knocked the police chief backwards in his chair. The lights blinked and snapped to black. Teddi drew her gun and straddled the doorway, alert to possible terrorists. In the darkness, she listened hard, but only detected ghostly wind howls and creaking tree limbs.
Suddenly, the station's front door flew open and crashed against the wall. A skulking shadow slid inside.
Elaine strained to turn her gaze from the gruesome patch of skin, but her neck remained inert from Big Man's dart drug -- Big Man -- that's what she called him now.
She watched in terror as he snapped the top two corners of her flesh between a pair of powerful alligator clips attached to a long rope pulley. The rope disappeared outside into the raging storm through a small square cut in a wall. Large enough for her flesh to clear. God, the lunatic was going to hang out her own bloody skin like ordinary laundry!
He tugged at the pulley rope until her flesh vanished outdoors. The wind ravaged it, but the clips held it fast.
He returned to Elaine, grabbed a long razor from his worktable, and slowly shaved her head. She saw some of the rain-soaked locks drop to the floor. She cringed in her mental room like a scolded child. An abused child. A terrified child!
When he finished shaving, he spread his hand over her face, obliterating her view. She didn't know whether to cheer or be even more afraid. What was he doing to the top of her head? Her visual perspective changed. More to the side. He had turned her head, but why?
Her heart thumped hard and fast. Close to rupturing. Normally, just the stress of walking to her mailbox at the street curb made her ticker drum a fierce tango beat. But this was way worse. So, why didn't she have a heart attack now and spare herself the ignominy and horror of this repulsive experience? Her cardiologist warned her repeatedly that she was a ripe candidate for a heart attack, but now that she remained alive after enduring this shocking trauma, the doctor was obviously full of . . .
Big Man removed his massive hand from her face. Elaine's eyes followed him back to the workbench where he exchanged the razor for a wide paintbrush. Must have been a four incher. She'd used one like it to paint the outside of her trailer last fall. What a bitch of a job that had been. Jeez, Elaine, now your mind's wandering!
He returned, and the paintbrush disappeared from her view above her head. Her shaved head. Now what? She shuddered to think. To imagine.
God, she was really losing it. Falling apart. Her thoughts came in vulgar language, like her asshole stepfather had freely used around her since kindergarten when he'd invaded her family. She had always despised his potty mouth, but now she was mind-speaking the same way. She hated herself for thinking it. She hated her stepfather. She hated Big Man. She hated the television and movie potty-mouths. There were potty-mouthed assholes everywhere! And right now she hated the whole damn world for it!
The paintbrush came back into view, and the bristles dripped blood. Her blood! She vomited in her mind room. Imaginary vomit. What had he done to her head to make it bleed like butchered cattle at the stockyards?
Her dazed eyes followed each brush stroke. When the bristles were stroked dry, he returned the brush to the top of her head. It came back into sight dripping her blood. Her head had been transformed into a paint bucket! She mind-vomited again.
Although she didn't have a good angle to see exactly what he was painting, it appeared as if she was Big Man's canvas. Varnishing her body with her own blood! What kind of nutcase was he, anyway? She prayed hard for that heart attack her quack doctor had promised.
Big Man saved her face for last. The piece de resistance. He roughly dabbed the bristles so close to her eyes that she feared he would poke them out, but they somehow survived. Finally, he tossed the paintbrush onto his worktable and walked beyond her range of vision.
The farmer in the dell, the farmer in the dell . . .
Jesus, she was singing that childhood song again. Her escape song each time her stepfather hit her mother or tore off her clothes. Rape and child molestation had been family rituals after his arrival. The sicko bastard! So she had stashed reality behind the impenetrable fortress of that little ditty where Floyd-the-Sicko couldn't reach her.
And now it was happening to her again. Another sicko invading her life. But, she figured this whacko would certainly be her last one if she wasn't rescued soon.
The lights flickered overhead, and she held her breath. Her imaginary breath. God, not darkness! She was deathly afraid of the dark. She hated night. Footsteps. Invisible footsteps approaching her bed. The invisible hands. The whisky breath. Her thighs being roughly split apart, and an invisible hard-on penetrating her. Pumping her. Pounding her. Spitting on her. Yep. Floyd-the-Sicko at work. That monster encouraged her to eat. And eat. Get fat. Grow big titties. For the invisible hands.
But the lights sputtered back to life, casting away her invisible horrors.
Big Man swept her off the table and dropped her unceremoniously into a wheelbarrow. At least it looked like one during her brief plunge. Two stained wooden handles. He gripped both and clenched an electric lantern handle between his teeth. It illuminated his eyes. Cruel, foreboding eyes.
He butted the doors open with the front edge of the wheelbarrow and shoved it and her into the furious wind and rain. Pines whipped wildly on each side, as she and her captor proceeded deeper into the tropical storm. The rain sheered her vision as before, and the trees became shadowy waving madmen. Then the madmen vanished from sight. Nothing to see but angry rain drops. And to top it off, the damn matchsticks held.
After what seemed like a excruciatingly long journey -- again, she had no sense of time -- they paused in front of an oddly shaped shadow. She heard a nearby door creak open beyond her head -- the bald paint can. Then he wheeled her inside the hulking shadow where the rain mercifully ceased pelting her eyes.
The light was dim, and he cast long shadows as he worked at something in the distance. Suddenly, she found herself sitting, and he fastened several straps around her. Clanks of metal echoed in the dry space as he slipped her lower body into a harness. He struggled and grunted with that part, and Elaine was glad. She hoped he got a hernia.
When Big Man finished, there was another metallic creak. No, it was more of a grating groan. He leaned over her and did something to her right arm. An injection? She couldn't see or feel it. Just a blurry flash of a syringe. God! What more tortuous drugs could he inject her with to intensify her terror? She would know soon enough.
Suddenly, he lowered her into a tight black hole that scraped her sides! Her vision gradually returned until she could see its rough, stony sides clearly. Her downward trek was punctuated with nauseous jerks. The harness appeared to be attached to a pulley rig like the one Big Man had used to thrust her flesh into the storm.
Elaine was now reduced to a quivering ball in the corner of her mind room. Darkness deepened all around her. Darkness! She screamed. Imaginary screams.
One of the matchsticks broke and her left eyelid blinked. Up and down. Up and down. She closed it against the deepening blackness, but her right eye was forced to observe the descending horror. Was she to be buried alive?
More imaginary screams.
She smelled the dankness. Felt the coolness prickle the hair on her arms. It took a moment for the significance to sink in, but when it finally did, she wanted to yell for joy. Her senses were back in working order!
Elaine willed her limbs to thrash in the constricting harness, or whatever it was, but her muscles were still drug-frozen. It was no use. Escape appeared impossible.
Still, she kept falling in slow motion. Deeper and deeper into -- what? A malodor assailed her nostrils and nearly gagged her. The blackness stank like piss, shit, and death all rolled into one horrible stench. Oh God, what was down there?
Her heart struck her ribs like a caged gorilla -- another returned sensation, but not a welcome one. It only served to amplify her panic. To incite her imagination to envision more hellacious horrors.
And still she dropped. Big Man's electric lantern was now a memory. So was his dreadful shape. What the hell was he up to?
Elaine was startled when her body finally reached solid ground. Because of her fear, she overlooked the fact that she would eventually hit bottom. More metal clanging echoed down from above -- maybe she was at the bottom of a well -- and then suddenly, the harness released her. She fell over like a roly-poly doll on her side.
Ouch!
Pain! Excruciating pain! Must be the side where Big Man cut away her skin. She heard more metallic clanging, and soon Big Man appeared, climbing down an old aluminum ladder with his lantern clenched between his teeth. He grabbed her feet and flipped her onto her back, and this time she felt it. Her senses were acute now, but her muscle response remained nil.
Big Man dragged her along a tunnel, and the top of her head and that one side both ached like a sons-of-a-bitches. She tried to scream, but all that emerged from her straining throat was a hoarse croak.
The deeper they trekked into the tunnel, the fouler the stench became. A stockyard and septic tank all rolled into one. Elaine regretted the return of her sense of smell.
The confining tunnel abruptly ballooned into an enormous room. A grotto perhaps. Elaine looked above and couldn't see the ceiling. Suddenly, they stopped moving. Big Man reached behind him and pulled out the rain-cleansed slice of her flesh from a backpack -- she'd never even seen him retrieve the horrible item! With a groan, he heaved it somewhere in front of them. She heard a soft plunk.
Was there a lake out there?
Big Man spun and glowered at her. The lantern momentarily bathed her in its yellow glare, and then without a word, he stepped over her hapless body and backtracked into the tunnel. The light vanished with him.
Her trepidation returned, and she languished in a numb stupor. In the pitch-blackness. She was a goner. Left to starve to death without dignity. Without hope.
Suddenly, waves lapped her toes and ankles. Then, larger swells gurgled and hissed and rolled over her. She sputtered and coughed the cool water from her throat and mouth.
Oh God! What was in the lake that could cause waves that size? She squeezed her eyes shut. Something big, that's what!
The waves came in a regular series. She shut her mouth and eyes each time one washed over her. Her hands wiped away the residual water.
Her eyes popped open and she studied her hands. They worked again! She wiggled her toes and bent her legs. All worked perfectly. Halleluiah!
As the next wave approached, she rolled and rose to her knees. The water slammed into her, knocking her onto her back again. She scrambled to her feet, and her knees wobbled like jelly. There was no time to lose. The next wave was coming, and it would surely topple her again.
Elaine retreated from the lake like a lame beggar. Her steps were small and unsteady, but she moved far enough away where the gurgling wash was too shallow to shove her down. Smiling, she turned toward the lake. Whatever had been in there couldn't hurt her now. She was saved!
She stuck out her tongue at the unseen lake. "Take that, asshole! Better luck next time." Her quivering voice echoed in the vast black expanse.
Suddenly a violent water eruption petrified her!
An unseen monster snatched her from the rocky shore in its tremendous jaws and crushed her before she could react. Her masticated form tumbled down its huge gullet.
Elaine Brewster's pathetic life was over.
"Freeze!" Teddi shouted into the gloom, her gun pointed at the invading silhouette. "FBI!"
"Don't shoot! It's me. Officer Fuentes!"
A flashlight beam stabbed the darkness in his direction. Dex stood behind her and pinpointed his deputy. "Dammit, what the hell happened outside?" he demanded gruffly.
"Transformer blew just as I was getting out of the squad car," Carlos Fuentes responded irritably. "It's miserable out there. There ain't much difference between a category one hurricane and a top-end tropical storm, I can tell you that."
Dex turned the beam toward his office doorway. "For godsake, get rid of that poncho and hightail it in here."
Teddi holstered her gun. "Another thing, Dex."
He paused, uncertain of what she was referring to. "Yeah?"
"All the Gator Creek abducted women were Caucasian."
He laughed loudly. "You never quit, do you?"
Late the next day, the tropical storm moved out of Broward County to Fort Meyers. The skies were now clear and cloudless, but the winds still gusted fiercely. Teddi rode with Dex to a small Gator Creek restaurant named Cohen's Deli, the site of the latest reported female disappearance. Dex parked his midnight blue Impala with a cherry on top in the washed-out alley behind the deli and greeted an excited Mr. Cohen.
The restaurant owner explained how he'd left Elaine Brewster in charge of closing and cashing out while he went home to his family. He berated himself for leaving her alone on such a stormy night, especially in light of the recent abductions.
When Mr. Cohen finished relating his story, Dex pointed at the dented red Neon across the alley that was now a gully wash after the heavy rains. White sand was piled up on the other side like a riverbank, and several broken tree limbs lay scattered helter-skelter across the parking lot. Mr. Cohen, a forty-something with wavy black hair, a full beard, a high voice, and a nervous demeanor, pointed at the car with a trembling hand.
"That's Elaine's car," he exclaimed, an anxious tremor in his voice.
Dex and Teddi crossed the gully and inspected the car. It was still locked. The glint of a shiny object thirty feet away caught Teddi's attention, and she drifted from Dex, slipped on a pair of latex gloves to preserve any prints that might be on the object, and picked it up. Car keys dangling from a Mickey Mouse key ring.
"These might be her keys," she told Dex, when she returned to the Neon.
"Slip one in the lock and let's find out."
The Plymouth key easily turned the lock with a click.
"Where's the remote locking device?" Dex asked Cohen.
"She lost it last year at some party. Never replaced it. Too expensive," he replied. "Poor woman. Never even made it to her car."
"Looks that way," Dex stated noncommittally.
A local news van turned into the alley, and Teddi stepped in front of it with outstretched arms. "This is an FBI crime scene. Back it up and stay a hundred feet from the deli and that red Neon. Got it?" she ordered them curtly.
The driver frowned, and the woman reporter in the passenger seat was already shouting into her cell phone. She didn't look pleased.
"How about an interview?" the driver shouted.
"Maybe later," she answered, and rejoined Dex.
"Lookie here," Dex said, kneeling on the sand bar farther down the alley.
Teddi inspected a deeply grooved depression in the mud beyond the sand. "Tire print. Think it belongs to our guy?"
"The way the print is perpendicular to the parking spaces, I'd say our suspect backed up as close as he could to Brewster's car to load her up."
"Pretty deep print."
"Yeah. A pick-up for sure. A big one, not one of those dinky foreign jobs."
"Why not a van or box truck?" she argued.
He stretched both hands across the depression, but they failed to touch the sides. "Wide mud tires. Only folks travelin' around the swamp use 'em. Lots of local kids have 'em installed on their lifted pickups to go muddin', but I'd wager that this guy wasn't a kid," he explained.
Teddi cocked her head. "And why's that?"
"Too tidy. Our boy isn't careless like the pot-smokin', joy-ridin' purse-snatchers who operate in these parts. Hell, they drop clues the size of bread loaves." He smiled wanly. "And our perp is big and strong."
"Because he had to physically handle the obese victims?"
"Mmm mmm."
"Could be two men, or even a gang, too," she countered.
Dex stood stiffly, massaged his lower back, and shook his head. "Nah, this guy's got secrets, and you know that if there were two people involved, one would blab."
"Secrets? Have I missed something here?" Teddi asked, a little miffed.
"Yeah, you've missed out on twenty years of detective experience, but as you can tell by my tired ole back, I haven't. There's only one logical reason that I can think of that a deranged fella like our perp would snatch five women in three weeks without asking for a little travelin' cash for their safe return."
Teddi gave the problem some deep reflection, but her FBI texts failed to depict a crime scenario quite like this. Even the Bureau shrinks and their profiling software came up empty on this case . . . at least so far.
"Okay, I'm stumped. Why would our perp do this without help and without asking for ransom?"
Dex bent, plucked a pebble from the sand bar and chucked it at the television van. It fell hopelessly short of its mark. "Because his victims are most likely dead. And that leads me to believe that he needs 'em for some kind of personal ritual sacrifice."
She whistled. "That's a little farfetched, don't you think? But if that is the case, then why's he kidnapping these women now? What's so special about this time of year?" She paused, her hands on her hips. "Or what event has occurred to instigate the ritual?"
Dex patted her shoulder lightly. "You've got a good head on your shoulders, kiddo. Those are exactly the questions that need answerin'."
She shrugged her shoulders. "Your theory still seems a bit of a stretch to me."
"Teddi, this is exactly how extraordinary crimes get solved."
"With fantastic theories?" she asked skeptically.
Dex studied the isolated red Neon. "Now you're gettin' it. The FBI computers are incapable of thinkin' beyond black and white. They deal in programmed scenarios and the odds of a crime fittin' one of them or not. This a fringe crime, accordin' to your ex-husband. Like tryin' to fit a round peg into a square hole, so to speak."
Teddi frowned. "He told you that?"
"Oh yeah, but your ex's programmed the same as his computers. He can't see beyond the scope of his computer printouts. That's why he's failed to locate our perp and why your boss sent you down here to replace him as lead investigator."
"I'm not following you. How does all that relate to your off-the-wall theory?"
His eyes twinkled as he swiveled his gaze to her. "You have a reputation for thinkin' outside the box, Teddi. Time to start livin' up to it."
By the time the FBI crime scene investigators arrived behind Cohen's Deli, Dex and Teddi were finished collecting blind-man's clues, as Dex referred to the obvious big stuff left by the perp. The tire marks and car keys were it. He indicated that if there had been any more evidence, the storm washed it away, but Teddi reminded him that the FBI believed in being thorough, so it would sift through the crime scene one more time.
When Dex pulled into the parking lot fronting the single-story, white stucco Gator Creek Police Station, a pair of Florida Power and Light trucks were parked off to the side. The crew was busily replacing the blown transformer on the wood pole outside Dex's office. A solitary man standing in the cherry-picker bucket among the tangle of live oak limbs was busy positioning the new transformer and bolting it in place. Two of the ground crew were splicing new electric cables to be hoisted up to the bucket man later.
Dex swung into his reserved space littered with small branches and mounds of Spanish moss, and Teddi grunted as she climbed from his car.
"Damn!" she muttered, spying the black FBI Chevy Suburban parked to their left.
Dex chuckled. "Trouble?"
"Big time."
He arched his shaggy brows. "How come?"
"My ex-husband's inside, and he's a . . ."
"Piece of work?"
"Piece of shit," she finished.
He nodded knowingly and led the way through the front door into the dimly lit lobby. The phone lights were black, and the coffee pot sat unused beside the Mr. Coffee.
Three men sporting blue lightweight jackets with the letters FBI emblazoned on the back in substantial letters turned abruptly as Dex and Teddi entered. A wide grin spread across the stockiest of the three.
"Teddi," he greeted her with faux-sincerity. "How nice to see you again."
"Cut the crap, Ryan," she snapped. "It was my understanding that you and I were never to work the same case after our divorce. We've been divorced for a month, so . . ."
Ryan Wilkerson held his hands out. "Whoa, sweetheart, this wasn't my doing. Honest. Blame Charlie Simmons. He's the one who told me to stay down here with you. Trust me, it wasn't my idea." He paused. "I guess he wants the best agents on this case."
"Go fuck yourself, Ryan. Dex and I don't need you here."
He turned to the other two agents. "See, guys, what I had to put up with during our marriage. Such a temper," Ryan cracked. He was five-foot-eight with a barrel chest and two hundred pounds of muscle. His wintry brown eyes peered out from a square face swathed in arrogance. He interlaced his thick fingers and cracked his knuckles.
"Just what are you doing here?" Dex demanded, annoyance simmering beneath his bland expression.
"The brass wants stakeouts at all the fat people hangouts," he replied smugly. "I'm here to oversee the operation. Seems the national press has gotten wind of these abductions and is turning up the heat on FBI Director Rance Osborne to catch this guy. So, he ordered his first team to stay down here to help you guys catch your perp. Charlie suggested that we make your office our center of operations."
Dex rubbed his jaw. "That was generous of him. What about Special Agent McCoy? She's in charge now," Dex inquired.
"She heading your investigation, but me and my boys are fronting the visible case and handling the press." Ryan turned to his ex-wife. "Call Charlie if you don't believe me."
Teddi stormed out of the station and dialed Simmons on her satellite phone. Her blood pressure spiked, and her temper festered beneath the stifling Florida sun. Charlie picked up his own phone on the first ring.
"Teddi," he said pleasantly. "Thought I might be hearing from you."
"How could you do this to me?" she nearly shouted. "Do you know how this looks to the other agents when you bump me and put Ryan in charge? Do you?"
"Hold on just a minute, Teddi, no one's taking you off the case! I sent Ryan down to Gator Falls . . ."
"Gator Creek," she corrected him.
"Right. Anyway, I want Ryan to try everything by the book to catch this crazy son-of-a-bitch to keep the press happy. Despite their public grumbles, they're having a field day with the story. Ratings have soared on all the major evening news programs."
"I'm so happy for them. Just where does that leave me?"
Charlie cleared his throat. "I said by the book. Personally, Rance and I don't believe for a minute that those tactics will flush this guy out into our nets. Ryan and his team are there to simply buy us some time, while you work behind the scenes with Dex, so to speak."
"Behind the scenes? Doing what? Ryan's laundry?"
Charlie laughed. "You can be so melodramatic sometimes, Teddi."
Teddi turned her mouth from the phone. "I can be a real bitch, too," she muttered.
"What? I didn't catch that."
"Never mind."
"Venting, huh?"
"You have no idea."
"Then I'm glad you're there and I'm here. I've seen you vent before, remember?" He cleared his throat again during the uneasy phone silence that followed. "I want you to look someone up for me and persuade him to join you down there."
Teddi planted her free hand on her hip. "Who?"
"Someone who can assist you in solving this case. I want the three of you to work as a team to nab this guy," Charlie explained.
"What about Ryan?"
"He'll be yanked off the case publicly when he fails to capture the perp. And, I stress again, he will fail. There's more to this kidnapper than meets the eye."
"That's the second time I've heard that today."
"Dex tell you that?"
"Yeah."
"I'm not surprised, obviously. Everything you see in Gator Creek is camouflage to the abductor. My theory is that he's buried in hundreds of years of Florida folklore and myths. Sort of a ritual thing."
"And my new partner'll be able to see past this supernatural camouflage?"
"If he can't, I don't know who the hell can."
Teddi wasn't completely sold on the supernatural angle. "What's his name?"
"Jackson LaFevre."
Teddi paused and ran the vaguely familiar name through her mental Rolodex. She glanced absently toward the east and was alarmed to see a bank of pitch-black clouds obliterating the horizon. No warm gray. Just angry obsidian. And, it was headed her way. God, more rain! Just what we need. A cool, briny gust rustled her blonde hair.
"Not the one they call the Cajun Psychic?" she said at last.
"The one and the same."
"But I heard that he works alone."
"It's up to you to persuade him to join the home team," Charlie said somberly. "And this isn't for publication. His help is strictly to be on the Q.T."
"You don't ask for much," she grumbled sarcastically. "The press is everywhere."
"You can handle it. That's why I sent you down there in the first place."
"You seem pretty confident that he'll help us."
"I have my reasons."
Teddi knew better than to press her superior. "So where do I find this psychic of yours?"
"Somewhere in the middle of the Louisiana bayou. Outside a place called Breaux Bridge. Ask around when you get there."
"You're kidding, right?"
"Never been more serious. He doesn't have a business card, and he sure as hell doesn't trust us."
She watched the power company workers hoist up the new electric cable. "Thanks. I'll keep you posted." Teddi disconnected the call and turned to find Dex waiting for her.
"More trouble?" he asked, observing her glum visage.
"Dex, you might say that I've just been shoved out of the frying pan into the fire."
"Charlie's turnin' up the heat, eh?"
"No. It's more like a four-alarm fire."
The storm drummed on the archaic tin roof, and the wind whistled shrilly through the splits in the rotting shutters. Alligator bellows carried across the Everglades; it was mating season, and the males were horny as hell. The single-story, ramshackle house rested on stilts to keep high water from invading the interior. The structure stood alone on an isolated key west of Fort Lauderdale and blended in well with its bleak surroundings. Lichen mottled the dark wood shingles, a blue-green that matched the trunks of the neighboring knock-kneed cypress and pine trees. Few knew of the structure's existence. Only the local gator poachers dared to hunt in that part of the swamp, but they knew enough to avoid trespassing on the small island.
According to Indian legends, the key was haunted. Many people throughout Florida's mysterious history had simply vanished there. Even gators had been found torn to scaly shreds. Generations of fishermen had quietly claimed that they had heard monstrous roars and had seen strange shapes in the mist, but no lawman had ever investigated those claims. They'd been too afraid.
Big Man liked it that way.
He stretched his tall sinewy frame in the tattered recliner and paid close attention to the six-o'clock news on a Fort Lauderdale television station -- especially the local news. His abductions were all the rage, and the jabbering reporters rehashed every detail of the missing women's lives without shedding any light on their disappearances. They bemoaned the FBI's and local law enforcements' failed efforts to arrest the kidnapper. Big Man laughed, deep and hoarse. No sympathy on that score.
A solitary candle beside Big Man's elbow kept the darkness at bay. The flickering television images cast transient shadows on the bare walls, but they didn't unnerve him. He was a part of the damn key curse, and nothing unsettled his nerves. Not the bull gators. Not the six-foot iguanas calling his key home. Not the water moccasins that were constantly underfoot.
He exhaled noisily. He wasn't being completely honest with himself. One key resident did rumble his bowels. He fingered a singular object clipped to a gold chain encircling his thick neck. It was a primeval miniature flute with extraordinary properties. As long as he possessed it, he was safe. Safe from it.
He leaned forward as the television picture switched to a live shot outside the dinky Gator Creek police station. Dex Lowe stood stoically in the background, a displeased host.
Big Man turned up the volume with his remote. The FBI was holding a brief press conference beneath the swaying oaks, and now he and a few hundred thousand viewers were stuck watching an FBI blowhard feed them a spew of misinformation.
What really caught his interest was the FBI spokesman at the makeshift podium. He looked like the typical bureaucratic asshole. This guy was named Supervisor Wilkerson, or so the snipe at the bottom of the screen declared. Hell, the name didn't matter. He was just another clone. What the hell had happened to the cute little piece-of- ass blonde agent who was in charge of the investigation?
" . . . and so there has been a change of guard in Broward County. The FBI takes this case very seriously, and we're expending an enormous amount of manpower here just as we would if we were faced with a terrorist threat. You will see results. The FBI's first team is here now," Wilkerson stated with a smirk, before the feed was switched back to the usual gang of idiots in the studio.
"Cocky SOB," Big Man muttered. "Stupid as hell, too. They'll never catch me now."
Suddenly, his eyes glazed over, and his consciousness faded to black. Two drummers, a crackling bonfire, six naked black female dancers, and a black robed figure filled his vacant mind. Great moss-infested trees flickered at the edge of the firelight as the drumbeats swelled to a frenzied rhythm. The nimble dancers gyrated at an unbelievably wild pace. The robed figure raised his hands. The drumming ceased, and the dancers dropped to their hands and feet. The robed figure murmured an ancient chant, and his robe suddenly crumpled to the ground. The figure inside was gone.
Big Man blinked awake, shook off the vision, and stood. He felt like a new man. More clever. More ruthless. He liked that. A lot. He stretched and yawned. He felt reborn.
He grabbed the candlestick and strode into his bedroom, the floor creaking beneath his weight as he walked. Dingy wrinkled sheets covered the saggy mattress, and his hunting outfit was draped over a headboard post. Black slacks, black cotton shirt, black rain slicker, snake boots, and a black rain hat. He dressed slowly as if it were a symbolic ritual, and when he finished, he snatched a box of drugged darts and his air rifle off the kitchen table.
He flung open the front door, and a violent draft tugged furiously at the cobwebs swaying in each kitchen-ceiling corner. The candle flame was rapidly extinguished as he stepped onto the groaning wooden steps that led to the ground. He looked up, shielding his eyes from the stinging raindrops. Gunmetal skies. Still enough light to cross the swamp and easily locate the boathouse on the mainland without using the airboat's searchlight.
His boot descended the final step, and it splashed onto the watery ground. Big Man grimaced. The swamp was rising quickly now, thanks to the tropical storm. Tropical Storm Allan, to be precise. After three weeks of steady rain, the swamp waters had gradually inched higher, but Allan's prolonged rainfall quickly raised levels to their highest in decades. If this shit kept up, the local roads would flood and close, and his hunting trips would be trickier. More dangerous.
He swallowed hard. If the damn floodwaters prevented him from hunting, all hell would break loose.
His ancient whistle suddenly felt icy against his chest. If that happened, the Everglades would become a cesspool of death. Bones, gore, and blood. Lots of blood.
Death.
Strangely, there was none of his customary dread at the mere notion of it being unleashed in the Everglades. No frigid tremble shivering his spine. Loosening his bowels. Raking his balls.
That was odd, he reflected. Damn odd. Ever since he was old enough to tie his shoes, he had learned a healthy respect for it. Now, out of the blue, he found that he wasn't afraid of it any more. He wasn't afraid of death, either.
What was up with that? Everybody should have a healthy fear of death.
Shouldn't they?
Suddenly, he was really afraid.
Teddi sat hunched over the notebook computer in her Coral Springs motel room. The solitary desk lamp was as dim as their investigative prospects as she pondered where to search for answers to those two all-important questions. What's so special about this time of year? What event has occurred to instigate Charlie's hypothetical ritual?
Lightning illuminated the walls bordering the heavy drawn draperies and momentarily distracted her. Thunder shook her third floor room with earthquake force and rattled her pencils in the plastic tray beside the computer. Wasn't it ever going to stop raining?
Another flash and report. That question was easily answered. Guess not.
She clicked on Florida Myths and Legends in the Google search space. Within seconds, a listing of over five thousand articles came up, most being advertisements for Florida. She clicked Florida Myths and read an entire article. When she finished, she sighed heavily. Too much information, and none of it pertained to the type of ritual she was hunting for. Undaunted, Teddi continued through the list.
Ninety minutes later, she leaned back in the uncomfortable chair and massaged her weary eyes. She now had a firm grasp on countless crank Florida legends and Indian myths, but she still hadn't advanced her knowledge about her case. And it was her case, according to Charlie, although she now had to share her jurisdiction with the arrogant Ryan and some eccentric nicknamed the Cajun Psychic.
Her fingers combed her short blond hair. Now what? In a split second, her mind replied, take a shower. Make it a long one.
She did. After toweling off, drying and styling her hair, and inspecting her complexion for wrinkles in the dresser mirror, she returned to the desk and her notebook computer.
Teddi was naked. She abhorred clothes in the summer; they were too constricting. Ryan had whined throughout their marriage that it wasn't a lady-like habit. After all, his mother had always worn clothes. She foolishly complied with his nagging to wear clothing at all times, at least when he was home. That should have been her first clue that they were completely wrong for each other. What man wouldn't want to see his wife naked? To her, it was a turn-on. To Ryan, a momma's boy, it was a turn-off.
But now Teddi was free of the jerk, and free to wear or not to wear whatever she wanted -- as long as it was legal!
The shower and her newly exercised freedom recharged her mind and spirit. She reflected that it was strange that water falling outside was depressing, while falling water inside a shower was refreshing. She shrugged. Chalk up another of life's paradoxes.
Her fingernails tapped a catchy rhythm on the desk edge as she considered her next research move. Suddenly, the rhythm ceased and her fingers flew over the keyboard like they were possessed. In a moment, the secure FBI search screen appeared, and she hurriedly typed in her password and personal ID code. The screen changed. She entered in the pertinent details of the Broward County abductions and began the search for similar crimes. The search engine found many similar crimes, but none with the exact modus operandi.
She continued her search with crimes against heavyset women with comparable results. Useless. She tried South Florida crime rings, South Florida kidnappings, devil worship and rituals involving human sacrifices, local fringe religions and their rituals, local Indian sacrificial rites throughout history, and unsolved South Florida crimes as far back as the middle 1800s.
Teddi's yawn was cut short. A single unsolved South Florida crime entry caught her eye. Interesting. Maybe even pertinent.
Teddi picked up the phone and dialed Dex. He was still at the office, watching over the gaggle of FBI agents who had invaded his space. He immediately brightened at the sound of Teddi's voice.
"Thought you'd be prowlin' the swamps up in Louisiana by now," he said quietly.
"I'm stalling."
"Don't blame you. Now, what's on that razor-sharp mind of yours?"
"I was wondering if I could buy you a beer . . . or two."
"Throw in dinner, and you've got my attention."
"No problem. Name the place."
"A little restaurant named Luke's Restaurant and Bar on Atlantic Boulevard, not far from your motel. Ain't much to look at, but they sure as hell serve the best food around these parts, includin' those damn high-priced, highfalutin rip-off joints." His suggestion was smothered in sarcasm.
"Tell me how you really feel, Dex!" she laughed. "How can I refuse an invitation like that?"
"You can't," he responded. "I'll meet you on two conditions."
"Name them," she said warily.
"One is that you leave that FBI scowl of yours at the motel."
"Done."
"And the second is that you bring a hearty appetite, 'cause Luke don't like people who just pick at their food."
Teddi chuckled. "Ole Luke won't have to worry about me. I'm starving."
Dex recited the directions to the restaurant from years of practice and then checked his watch. "Meet you there in thirty minutes?"
"Perfect."
Big Man squinted through the rivulets coursing down the parked pick-up's windshield and waited for his latest quarry to emerge from the bar. Half-lit neon liquor signs filled the front two windows and illuminated the shabby exterior of the Pompano Beach tavern in a murky red glow. This was the farthest he'd ventured from his home to nab a woman, but he figured that gung-ho, FBI asshole Wilkerson would most likely have positioned his men in the seedy spots between Coral Springs and Gator Creek.
For nearly a month now, Big Man witnessed a hefty young woman frequenting this bar during his nocturnal scouting trips. She was no doubt somebody's low paid employee who needed to share her complaints with others down on their employment luck. This was the place to do that, all right. He grinned. And being the humanitarian he was, he was about to put an end to her misery.
His trip into Pompano Beach had been a real bitch. Most of the side roads were under water, and the main drags were filling up fast. The sleazy bar in front of him was gradually becoming a sleazy island. Arriving patrons sloshed from the cinder parking lot to the front door, cursing the puddles. On the way out, they wouldn't notice or care. Their wobbly strides would create soaking splashes, and a few would fall face first into the filthy puddles, ruining their alcohol high in one sobering second.
Big Man glowered at the unrelenting rain. The leading edge of the latest storm was past the east coast, but it left days of rain in its wake. No afternoon sea breeze storms this summer. Just one damn rainy weather front after another. If this kept up, he'd need an ark to secure his plump beauties. But that's the way it had always been. The uncommon monsoons attracted it to Demon Key.
Big Man dozed, then awoke with a start. He checked his watch. Four hours had passed. It was just before two. The bar would be closing any minute. The young woman would certainly be soused by now. Easy prey.
The front door opened once more, and his target staggered outside. The rain drenched her clothing within seconds, revealing her nipples and generous fat rolls. Disgusting. He tightened his grips on the dart rifle and door handle. Showtime.
As he pushed open the pick-up door, a figure burst from the shadows between the bar and a dry cleaning business next door. A young black man wore a stocking cap and waved a pistol in the woman's face.
Big Man heard the thief shout, "Give me your purse, bitch!"
The woman was too drunk to react rationally. She hugged the dripping purse to her breasts and screamed for help. Big Man made a quick decision to rescue her. He raised the rifle and targeted the thief's neck. The rifle explosion caught the man's attention, and he spun around, aiming the pistol at his attacker. The dart struck him in the throat.
The thief's hands flew to the protruding dart as he struggled to breathe. His pistol plummeted into the puddled water at his feet. He dropped to his knees on the sidewalk, kicking and trying to scream for help.
The drunk woman didn't know what to make of her rescue.
Big Man approached her and flipped his wallet open and shut. "Police, maam," he lied. "Just out here doing a routine check for people too drunk to drive home safely. Part of the county's drinking and driving safety program."
She pointed down at the struggling would-be thief. "He . . . he tried to rob me!"
"I know. Just climb inside the pick-up, while I call for an ambulance and back up officers. You can fill out the complaint form in the truck where it's nice and dry." He led her to the pick-up and helped her slide onto the seat. "I'll be right back."
He opened his cell phone, turned away from her, and pretended to place a call. He bobbed his head just enough so she would believe that he was conversing with someone. He kept his gaze focused on the bar's front door the entire time, hoping that no one inside had heard her screams. But luckily no one showed.
The thief finally stopped thrashing and lay still on his side in a fetal position. His eyes bulged from their sockets like red-veined marbles, and his thick tongue dangled limply between his parted lips, nearly bitten in half. Big Man bent, grabbed the man's wrist, and felt for a pulse. There was none. The thief was history. He yanked the bloody dart from the boy's throat, bent the tip, and stuffed it into his pocket. The kid didn't weigh enough to handle the dose meant for someone almost twice his weight.
He snatched his air rifle propped against the pick-up's front quarter panel and opened the door. The frightened and drunk woman stared wide-eyed out the streaked windshield at the thief's prone body.
"I'm afraid he's dead, maam," Big Man informed her, as he climbed behind the wheel. He stuck the rifle behind the seat and started the ignition.
"I thought I was supposed to fill out some paperwork here," she whined. "And my car's right over there."
"You're too wasted to drive. Let me take you home," he replied coldly.
"But you said . . ."
He pulled a dart from his pocket and thrust it into her neck. She screamed again and punched him hard in the nose. Warm blood gushed over his lips, and he licked its saltiness. The stupid cow! He seized her flabby wrist and restrained her until the dart worked its magic. After what seemed an eternity, her large body finally went limp. He let it slam against the door, then tended to his bleeding nose with a handkerchief.
Two men stumbled through the front door and nearly tripped over the thief's soggy corpse, as Big Man backed away from the bar. He saw them point toward his retreating pick-up as it sped away into the rainy gloom, but he wasn't worried about those drunks identifying it. The license plates were smeared with mud, and the truck's lights were off.
He drove the entire distance to the airboat at or below the speed limit. It wouldn't do to get pulled over for speeding. No, that just wouldn't do.
He leaned into his victim's face. He knew she could see and hear him.
"I've got a nice surprise for you, you fat sow! A little payback for this bloody nose."
He chortled cruelly and pressed the handkerchief tightly against the bridge of his swollen nose. Oh yeah. Miss Nose-puncher was going to love his surprises.
Even in the downpour, Teddi easily located Luke's Restaurant and Bar on Atlantic Boulevard. The moment she entered the modest restaurant, the deliciously tantalizing aroma of oak-grilled foods assailed her nostrils. Plastic blue and white checked tablecloths covered the dozen tables, and the worn cane-backed chairs appeared Old World and comfortable. Dex waited for her at a table in the far corner.
Teddi watched his eyes widen at her approach. She wore a coral ribbed tank, white-cuffed shorts that broke in the center of her thighs, and blonde Sperry Topsiders. Blush pinkened her tanned cheeks, and eye shadow heightened the allure of her green eyes. Coral earrings dangled from her ear lobes and matched the shell necklace hugging her exposed neck. This wasn't a date, but she wanted to look like a woman tonight, not an FBI agent.
Dex stood as she sat down across from him. "You look like a million bucks. If I was about twenty years younger, I'd make a play for you."
Teddi tingled from the praise. It had been a long time. "You're too kind."
He sat. "Have much trouble findin' the place?"
"Piece of cake," she replied with a grin.
"See you left your FBI mask at the motel like I asked."
"Gladly," she said, and picked up a two-sided menu. "What do you recommend?"
"You like ribs?"
"Is the Pope Catholic?"
"Then I'd go for the full slab of baby-backs," he suggested.
A stout man with thin black hair appeared beside the table. He wore a smudged white apron and a wide smile. "Hi, Dex. Who's the beautiful lady?"
She extended her hand. "Teddi McCoy."
"Luke Russet, like the potato," he announced, shaking her proffered hand. "Pleased to meet you. Any friend of Dex's is always welcome here."
"Thanks, I'll remember that," she said.
Luke took their orders and disappeared into the kitchen in back.
"Now, what's on your mind?" Dex asked, as he placed the large linen napkin on his lap.
Teddi retrieved a piece of paper from her purse, unfolded it, and handed it to him. "Read this."
He slipped on his reading glasses, and when he finished reading the article, he dropped the glasses back into his shirt pocket.
"Afraid this happened before I was even a gleam in my father's eye," he grinned.
"I know, but it's the only case I could find during my Florida crime search that had similar characteristics to ours."
He leaned back in the chair. It creaked. "This kidnappin' spree took place in 1856 when Broward County was mostly populated with settlers, cowboys, and Indians. Did you find any similar points that would link it to our current kidnappin's?"
"As a matter a fact, I did. On a hunch, I checked the same newspaper for weather conditions during those old abductions, and guess what?"
"It rained like hell," he guessed.
"You got it."
"I'll be damned." He thought a minute. "You're sure that there weren't any other crimes listed in this neck of the woods between then and now?"
"Nope."
Luke planted two frosted mugs of beer and a loaf of warm French bread in front of them and vanished again.
Dex scratched his clean-shaven chin and took a swig. "Strange. What would heavy rain have to do with some nut going on a kidnappin' binge?"
Teddi downed half her mug with one pull. The cold beer was just what the doctor ordered to take the edge off of bumping into good ole Ryan earlier. "You've got me. There were eleven women reported missing during those heavy rains, and none of them was ever seen again. No happy homecomings or dug-up skeletons."
"Big women?"
"The article didn't address that detail, and I couldn't track down any more information about those abductions off the Internet."
He scratched his chin again. "Maybe I can help you out there, Teddi. I just happen to know the descendants of the owners of that newspaper. It's defunct, you know."
"I guessed as much. I never heard of the Everglades Press."
Luke appeared with a tray of steaming ribs, cole slaw, and crispy crinkle-cut fries. The slathered, smoky-red barbeque sauce glimmered under the ceiling lights.
"Anything else?" Luke asked.
"Another round of beer," Dex replied.
"Coming right up."
"Where do those newspaper descendants live?" Teddi asked, draining the last swallow of beer.
"Funny thing about that. Jessie lives in a mobile home park right outside Gator Creek."
Her brows arched. "How convenient."
"Very. Now let's dig in before our ribs get cold."
And they did, but only after he swore on his mother's grave that he would visit Jessie the next morning.
Teddi had just slipped into a deep sleep when the phone on the nightstand rang. The ring was loud and shrill, enough to wake the dead. She glanced groggily at the radio-alarm clock. It read 2:41 am. Now who was calling her this late at night? Dread gnawed her stomach as it always did when someone called in the middle of the night.
Trouble or tragedy. Roll the dice.
She fumbled the receiver, and it dropped to the sheets. She picked it up again.
"Hello?"
"Teddi, it's Ryan. Get your ass out of bed! We've got our first lead on our abductor," her ex-husband shouted. He gave her a Pompano Beach address and hung up.
She threw back the covers, phoned Dex, and quickly dressed.
Teddi had no problem locating the address. At least a half-dozen rescue vehicles and cop cars were parked at various angles in front of a seamy bar with their blue and white lights flashing in the gloom. She spotted Dex's Impala in the small lot beside the bar and parked next to him.
He stepped out of the car and walked toward her dark green Jeep Liberty. Teddi opened her umbrella and joined him.
"Quite a circus," he remarked solemnly.
"What's up?"
"Dead African American teen. About seventeen would be my guess," he answered.
"And our perp?"
"You'll have to ask your ex. He's stayin' mum about that."
"Figures," she muttered, and marched through the standing water to the crowd of uniformed men outside the bar. Three wore FBI hooded rain slickers.
"If it isn't Mary Poppins," Ryan joked, nodding at her umbrella.
"Knock-off the smart-ass remarks and tell me how this dead guy is related to our case," she demanded.
Ryan nodded toward the lump beneath a black tarp. "Our perp murdered this man. Exactly why, I have no idea, but I'm sure our kidnapper's the guy. The victim took a dart to the throat, and judging from the depth of penetration, it was fired from a rifle or pistol at close range. I'm having our lab boys run a full toxicity screening and determine the exact cause of death," he reported brusquely.
"So why are you so certain that this was the work of our perp?" Teddi prodded.
Distant lightning flashed on the ocean horizon, as Ryan's lips spread into his infamous shit-eating grin.
"Because one of the patrons of this fine establishment is missing. A heavyset woman named Shelene Foster," he replied smugly. "And I have two somewhat reliable witnesses who swear that they saw her riding away in an older model Ford pick-up with some guy."
"License plate number?" she snapped.
"In their somewhat inebriated condition, they were fortunate to see the pick-up," he replied. "One of them thought the plate was covered with mud, but the truck's lights were out, so he couldn't tell for sure."
"That's a couple too many somewhat's for me to take your witnesses seriously," Teddi retorted.
Ryan pulled his hood closer to his face. "We're going ahead with or without you, Teddi, so get over it. I didn't request to be sent down to this mosquito-infested hellhole."
The rain dribbled over the edge of her umbrella. "Fuck you, Ryan! This investigation isn't about you or me! It's about all those missing women, and now we have another one -- Shelene Foster. Let's focus on that for a second, okay?"
He shrugged again. "Sure, why not. We're professionals here, right?"
"I certainly hope so."
"Good. Just stay out of my way if you're not interested in my leads. Me, I care about that dead boy over there, and I'm sure as hell fascinated by what my two witnesses told me. If you really want to help, put out an APB on a nineties-something Ford pick-up, full-size and either dark green or black," he suggested gruffly. "Oh, and one more thing. The truck had a Florida license plate."
"They're positive?"
"Yeah. Big fruity oranges showed through the mud streaks. It certainly isn't New Jersey's."
"Asshole."
"Bitch."
Dex stood on the periphery of the conversation, but took it all in. When Teddi stomped away, he grabbed her elbow.
"Don't let that schmuck get you all riled up," he advised her. "Forget who he is, and remember why you're here."
"It's harder than it sounds."
"I know, but if you let him bully you like that, this crime will never get solved."
"Meaning?"
"Meanin' that ex-husband of yours couldn't find his ass with both hands. He's in it for the newspaper headlines and bureau promotions. Someone else will have to put the pieces together for him."
Teddi managed a grim smile as she wiped the blowing rain from her face.
"And furthermore," he continued, "you're those women's only hope of rescue, if they're still alive. I suggest that we split up for the next couple days. We can cover more ground that way, because time is of the essence here."
"You know, I feel the same sense of urgency." Her face was suddenly pinched with concern.
"What's eatin' you now?" Dex inquired.
"I just had a disturbing thought."
Dex waited.
"What if the rain stops, and dry weather sets in? The kidnapper might stop, and we'll never have another opportunity to catch him."
Teddi agreed with Dex that they needed to split up. He planned to question the descendant of the old Everglades Press owner, while she flew to Louisiana to locate the FBI's psychic resource, Jackson LaFevre. She called the Washington office when she returned to her motel and requested the Cajun Psychic's phone number and address. Securing both, she tried calling Jackson LaFevre during her drive to the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, but got nothing but rings. No answer. No voice mail. She turned off her satellite phone after she boarded the plane bound for Lafayette, Louisiana. Just what kind of help was this guy going to be if he wouldn't answer his damn phone?
In the back of her mind, she suspected that she was on a wild goose chase. What if LaFevre was out on another assignment? What if he refused to help her? For that matter, why didn't Charlie Simmons make contact with this volatile guy himself?
Suddenly, she felt like a fool, maybe even a sacrificial lamb. Perhaps Charlie had handed her this assignment to keep her out of Ryan's hair during the ongoing investigation. If that was the case, Charlie Simmons was going to get an earful when she returned to Washington. Maybe even her resignation.
She sighed. No use getting worked up over this LeFevre weirdo and Charlie's possible treachery until the situation warranted it. It was counterproductive. Stay cool and just find this swamp guy, Teddi.
The plane landed on time at Lafayette Airport, and a representative of Atchafalaya Swamp Tours met Teddi outside the baggage claim area. He threw her over-night bag into the front seat and headed east on Interstate 10 to the small town of Breaux Bridge, which boasted seven thousand residents. The driver turned into a tour business parking lot where Agricole LeBlanc, her personal tour guide, greeted her.
"Good morning," he smiled, his white teeth in stark contrast to his deep olive skin. He was Hollywood handsome, medium build and height, and in his mid-twenties. "You want me to take you into the bayou, no?" he asked with a clipped Cajun accent.
"I'm afraid so." She unfolded a slip of paper with LaFevre's address and handed it to the guide. "I'm in kind of a hurry, Mr. LeBlanc."
He shook her hand and gently raised it to his lips. "Please, call me Cole." He kissed the back of her hand, and Teddi felt a slight tingle. Two in two days. She felt like a giddy heroine in a romance novel, but only for a few seconds.
"Thanks, Cole," she managed, with a slight blush. "But I'm still in that rush."
"All you FBI agents are in a big hurry to take care of business. What would it hurt to stop and smell the roses for an hour and see the real bayou?" His voice was melodic and charming.
"Because innocent lives are on the line back in Florida," she replied firmly. "If I dawdle away that hour of yours, another life may be taken that could have been saved. So, let's skip the tour and head over to Jackson LaFevre's place. Okay?"
Cole hunched his shoulders. "You're the boss. Maybe another time, no?"
"That might be lovely."
They boarded a three thousand pound airboat, and she caught herself admiring his sculpted body as he threw off the mooring lines and tossed her a pair of ear protectors resembling headphones.
"The engine's verrry loud," he said in his tour voice. "You can hear me through the headphones."
Teddi nodded and watched civilization quickly give way to the gloom of the bayou. Alligators snoozed on muddy banks in the shade of Spanish moss tinseled willow, red maple, live oak, and tupelo trees. The lush swamp foliage was both breathtaking and foreboding. When the thick overhead canopy broke for a short distance, Teddi observed several bald eagles and red-tailed hawks gliding overhead in the sunlit sky.
Although Cole pointed out the various streams and rivers as they changed course, all Teddi could see was marshy wetlands spanning the entire landscape. There were no signs of merging streams or rivers. Just swamp to her.
She swatted a nasty black mosquito perched on her arm as they reached the darkest section of the bayou, and Cole tossed her a can of mosquito repellent. Great! If she applied that, she would reek of that oily scent when she met LaFevre. She threw the can back to Cole.
"I'll take my chances," she mouthed.
A half hour into their trip, a long dock came into view. It appeared new, with green pressurized wood for framing and planks. The supports were securely fastened to several concrete pilings. Teddi wondered why there was no boat present. Her old fear resurfaced. Was LaFevre even here?
Cole slowed the engine, guided the airboat parallel to the wooden frame, and looped the mooring lines over two of the pilings. He shut down the engine and removed his headset.
"This is it," he announced, his eyes nervously scanning the brief shoreline.
Teddi's gaze failed to penetrate the tangle of foliage. "I don't see a house."
"Take my word for it, it's back there -- way back there. Just follow that stone path for about a quarter mile, and you'll see it," he explained, then swallowed. "Jackson doesn't like visitors, so I suggest that you shout out your name and why you're there every fifty feet or so."
She cocked her head. "Why in the world would I do that?"
"So he doesn't shoot you. His motto is 'shoot first and ask questions later,'" Cole replied grimly. "He's one eccentric dude."
Dex rolled out of bed at the crack of dawn and greeted another rainy day. Since Isaac Noonan was an early riser, he thought he'd get this over with and save the rest of the day for more weather related emergencies.
The police chief parked his Impala in front of an old beige doublewide manufactured home in the center of a quaint retirement community. The St. Augustine lawn was under water as Dex sloshed his way between two queen palms to the side door.
Sergeant Ike awaited him behind the screen door, slumped in his electric wheelchair. The old military man was badly crippled with arthritis; his fingers and toes were gnarled dysfunctional tangles, and his deformed spine resembled the infamous Hunchback of Notre Dame. His face was twisted in agony, and his dark eyes were glossy slits from his potent pain medications.
"This damn rain's kicking the shit outa me, Dex," Ike grumbled, as he slid the screen door aside and rolled backward in his wheelchair. "My joint pain's near intolerable these days."
Dex draped his dripping rain slicker over the coat hook to the left of the doorway. "Sorry to hear it, Ike. Life sure stinks sometimes, doesn't it?"
"Sure does. C'mon in and sit a spell."
"I'd like to, but I'm pretty much pressed for time these days."
"The kidnappings?"
Dex nodded. "Afraid so."
"I figured you might be by to check out a similar crime written up in my granddad's newspaper a long time ago," he said.
"You did, did you? Why didn't you call me and let me know about this old crime? Mighta helped me shut down this guy by now and save some women's lives," he muttered.
"My phone's been disconnected, and I ain't exactly in shape to make a run to your office," he snapped back.
"You gotta point there, Ike. Sorry. So where are these articles of yours?"
"C'mon back to my granddad's newspaper gallery. My dad transferred most of the old papers to microfiche and willed 'em to me. Fill's my whole damn third bedroom," Ike complained, as he led Dex in that direction.
Ike wasn't kidding. Corrugated file boxes identified by months and years were nearly stacked to the seven-foot ceiling, blocking all the windows and the bathroom door on the opposite side of the confined room. Only a narrow corridor remained clear that allowed Ike to navigate between the boxes in his powered wheelchair.
He switched on the lights. "I believe 1856 is the year we want, possibly May and June," the eighty three year old mumbled.
"Yeah, the spring of 1856."
Ike raised his crooked hand in the direction of a middle carton. "You'll find what you're looking for there, Dex. I'd pull it out for you, but I can't do doodlie shit with these hands any more."
"No problem, Ike. I can handle it."
"Thank your lucky stars that you can. Time'll come that maybe your wings won't fly, either."
"Believe me, I am thankful," Dex replied, as he scanned the dates. Bingo! He slipped the box neatly from beneath four others like a filing master and flipped off the cover. He pulled out a flat, thin plastic case. 1856. May and June.
"Got someplace I can view these?" Dex asked.
"Grab that white box in the corner there and follow me to the kitchen table."
Dex set up the light viewer on the maple table, inserted the first microfiche slide, and began his search. A couple minutes later, he froze. He found another article on the kidnappings -- three weeks earlier than the one Teddi had come across on the Internet. The closing line chilled him:
Sadly, it appears as if these kidnappings won't be over until the last fat lady vanishes.
He slowly studied the kidnapping articles, taking notes so he could accurately update Teddi when she returned with that psychic fellow. After an hour, Dex rubbed his strained eyes and closed down his little operation. He returned the box and viewer case to their original positions and thanked Ike for his help.
"Hope to hell you can catch the bastard this time. My dad recited that dreadful old story a lot throughout my younger years. The sheriff back then, Ben Gandy, never did find that scoundrel, and he was so bothered by all the criticism from the local folks that he resigned and opened up a hardware store in Buffalo," Ike remarked.
"You don't say?"
"I do, and I swear on my old man's grave that that's the absolute truth."
"Well I'll be."
Ike paused a moment. "You interested in the hardware business?"
Dex laughed. "Not in the least."
"Well then, I certainly hope that you have better luck than ole Sheriff Ben Gandy did in 1856."
Dex nodded, then sobered. "Is there anything else you can remember from your dad's stories that weren't published in these newspaper articles?"
Ike scratched his temple with the back of his swollen wrist. "Maybe," he replied vaguely, as if trying to recall something important. Suddenly, he brightened. "I don't know how much this is gonna help you, Dex, but I remember my old man repeating an old Miccosukee Indian folk tale about a killer demon that invaded the Everglades during years of heavy rains. The tribe lost a hulluva lot of braves and warriors fighting this creature, but they never could kill it. Finally, it would just up and disappear somehow. From then on, whenever the real heavy rains came, the Injuns abandoned their villages and didn't return until the flood waters receded." Ike coughed. "Some folks back in 1856 thought they saw a monster out in the glades. A big 'un. But nobody had the gumption to hunt the thing."
Dex grinned. "That's some story all right."
"Mind you, Dex, some of those old tales have a smidge of truth in 'em. Don't be so anxious to reject them as crazy talk."
"I'll consider it if that monster of yours can drive a black or dark green pick-up."
Ike's laugh was a dry cackle. "Damn you, Dex. You had me going there for a second."
"See you 'round, Ike."
"God willin'"
As Dex drove away, he failed to notice a black pick-up parked around the corner from Ike's place. After Dex exited the retirement community, Big Man eased the pick-up to a silent stop behind Ike's doublewide and quietly approached the side door with a black leather valise in his hand that looked like an old-time doctor's bag.
He paused beside the sliding screen door, listening for Ike, and then yanked it aside.
The screen door slammed against its stop, startling Sergeant Ike. A large familiar figure entered his house.
"Hello Ike," Big Man snarled ominously. "Been flappin' your jaw to the heat, eh?"
"Dex asked to see an old newspaper article, that's all, Bo. Now get the hell outa here before I call Dex and have you arrested," Ike bluffed, well aware that his phone was disconnected.
"That won't be necessary, gimp!"
Bo strode over to Ike, opened the black valise, and emptied its contents onto the helpless crippled man. Thick squirming water moccasins rained down upon Ike's head and body; two curled in his lap while several others slithered on the floor at his feet!
Bo clucked his tongue. "You won't be doin' no more blabbin' about me and my family, Ike, 'cept to the Lord, iffen he'll take delivery of your worthless old hide in Heaven."
Ike screamed and swiped at the poisonous snakes with the backs of his deformed hands and kicked at them with the shoeless gnarled stumps below his ankles, but his motions only served to aggravate the bad-tempered serpents. The hissing snakes struck him repeatedly, sinking their venomous fangs into his pallid flesh.
Bo retreated and observed the gruesome proceedings from the doorway, and chuckled as Ike's face swelled to a purple balloon. His mottled arms and legs gradually turned a deep shade of bluish purple, too, and after a few wheezing breaths, the old man slumped forward in his wheelchair. Dead.
Dex swore and made a U-turn on the narrow road. He left his damn reading glasses at Ike's, but fortunately he remembered exactly where he'd left them for a change -- on the kitchen table. Fifty and forgetful. God, he hated that age. Give him forty again, or even his airhead twenties, but skip fifty.
Dex parked in front and splashed toward the side door. It was wide open, and a water moccasin was coiled on the top concrete step, its triangular head watching him approach the doublewide.
Wary, Dex stopped. "Ike, you in there?"
No answer. Maybe he was in the can and couldn't hear the shout.
"Ike!" he yelled louder.
Still no answer.
Dex drew his revolver and sloshed closer in the ankle deep water toward the door. The moccasin raised its ominous head, opened it mouth wide enough to display its intimidating white cotton-looking lining, and prepared to strike. Dex leveled his gun barrel at the inviting target and squeezed the trigger. The head burst into bloody threads that splattered the inside wall of the doublewide, and its decapitated body wriggled and squirmed wildly before slipping into the water and floating belly-up.
Dex stepped over the gore on the threshold and stopped abruptly. There were several more moccasins inside. Beyond them, he glimpsed the horribly swollen and discolored corpse of Sergeant Ike Noonan in his wheelchair.
Dex grabbed his cell phone and called the Broward County Sheriff's office. The operator placed him on hold. As he stared down the stationary snakes, it seemed an eternity before Sheriff James Stark answered.
"What can I do for you, Dex? I've got a pretty full calendar today," he announced, sounding frazzled as always.
"Got a dead body in your jurisdiction," Dex replied. "Ike Noonan."
"Jesus, Dex. He was a friend and supporter. Heart attack?"
"Try snake attack, and it looks to me like murder."
"You're kidding, right? Who'd want to murder that harmless old guy?"
Suddenly Dex heard a loud whoosh out back, and he turned and sprinted for all he was worth out of the house toward his car. He barely reached it before Ike's place detonated into a raging fiery mushroom. Dex jumped into the Impala and sped away to escape the raining debris. Some of it banged, clanged, and thumped onto his roof, hood, and trunk as he raced along the flooded street, kicking up waves that would delight an east coast surfer.
"What the hell was that?" Stark yelled.
Dex had almost forgotten his cell was still connected. He plucked the phone off the bench seat.
"Somebody just blew up Ike's house, James."
"What!"
Dex hastily described the crime scene when he'd first arrived.
"Snakes! Now who the hell would sic them on that old man? And why, for godsake? Hold on a second." Stark put Dex on hold again, but this time the sheriff returned quickly. "The fire department's on the way, Dex. Mind sticking around till I get there?"
"Not a bit."
After the firemen extinguished the last smoking embers, James Stark, the fire marshal, and Dex walked the perimeter of the blackened lump that had once been Ike Noonan's home. Stark was a black man in his late forties who had attended many law enforcement seminars, political dinners, and county commission meetings with his longtime friend, Dex Lowe. James Stark was tall, slender with a slight paunch, and handsome. Stress strained his face as he stared at the destruction.
Dex knelt and examined several depressions in the mud behind Ike's former residence. Jerry Lawton, the fire marshal, and Stark peered over his shoulders.
Dex traced the outline with his fore finger. "The same tread," he said absently.
"Mind filling us in?" Stark pressed.
"These are the same tire marks that I found behind Cohen's Deli after Elaine Brewster's kidnappin'," he explained.
"You're positive?" Lawton inquired.
"Absolutely. The FBI's got the Brewster molds, but I reckon they'll let us compare these marks to theirs."
"I wouldn't bet on it." Stark straightened. "When my crime scene people are finished, we'll see just how sharing the FBI really is."
"Bring the tire molds over to the station. That's where they're holed up for the duration of this investigation."
Stark laughed grimly and slapped Dex on the back. "Lucky you. I saw that cocky son-of-a-bitch Wilkerson on the tube yesterday, and I didn't like his smug bullshit one damn bit."
"That makes two of us."
"Mind signing my incident form?" Lawton asked Dex, extending a clipboard with several sheets of paperwork attached.
Dex's hand went for the reading glasses in his shirt pocket, but came up empty.
"Missing something?" Stark asked.
"Yeah. My readin' glasses." He nodded toward the burnt hulk beside them. "I left them inside." He squinted and signed the three spaces reserved for law enforcement signatures.
Stark frowned. "And what were your glasses doing inside Ike's place?"
"I'll fill you in when you stop by with the tire molds," Dex replied, and ambled down the flooded street to his parked car. He knew the FBI wouldn't cooperate, and so there was little chance that he'd have to reveal what he'd found at Ike's place.
Jerry Lawton stared hard at Dex's retreating form, but Stark merely shook his head.
"Give it a rest, Jerry. Dex is cool," Stark said, and waded out front to greet his arriving crime scene team.
Big Man, Bo, gazed out the living room window toward the cemetery knoll three hundred feet behind his Demon Key home. A murky ground mist shrouded the grave markers; only the mausoleum at the top of the hill was fully visible. He sipped his coffee and pondered his next move.
Dex Lowe was a nice enough guy. Bo had known him his entire life, but if Dex's prying through Ike's old newspaper collection would threaten his mission, then Sheriff Nice Guy would have to be eliminated. It wouldn't be an easy chore with those FBI agents camped in the Gator Creek police station, though. No, he would have to knock-off Dex when he was at home, where he rarely was these days.
Bo took another sip. Hot and Black. Just the way he loved his coffee. It settled his nerves. Stimulated his thinking.
He gritted his teeth. This whole damn business was getting too frigging complicated. Much more complicated than in the past. Too many FBI agents snooping around with modern equipment. A fairly smart police chief with good instincts. He would have to exercise extreme caution at every abduction site. A carelessly dropped hair, a flake of skin, or drop of blood could spell the end to his anonymity.
He drained the last swallow from the cup. The swamp waters were still rising, and the television news folks predicted that the flooded Sawgrass Expressway would be closed from the Florida Turnpike to I-75 by tonight, dumping the outer belt rush hour traffic onto the already soggy surface streets. What a mess. Another thorn in his side. He had to cross the Sawgrass Expressway every time he visited the mainland. Now it would be a pain in the ass to travel unseen to and from his mainland dock and town.
Bo tipped the coffee pot and refilled his cup. Reviewing the facts helped him bury the sadness of having to off old Ike. Unfortunately, it had to be done. The cripple knew too much, even though the painkillers had likely erased most of his memories of the 1856 abductions. Ike's father, Jeremy, had never stopped chattering about the abductions, even though he hadn't even been around back then. According to his own father, Jeremy Noonan loved telling stories of the Miccosukee monster when he was snockered, and Ike reciting that legend to Dex would definitely spell trouble for Bo.
As long as there was a chance of that happening, there was also a chance Dex could land on Bo's doorstep with an arrest warrant. That wouldn't do. No, not at all. There was too much at stake. Like Ike, Dex had to go. End of rationalization.
Bo absently fingered the ancient flute dangling at his neck. Soon, he'd have to search for another chunky chick. A nice meaty meal. Maybe as soon as tomorrow night. It would be getting hungry again.
But tonight was Dex's night. Bo would silence the cop for good. That would dump the investigation on the obtuse Sheriff Stark and his deputies. He had nothing to fear from Stark or that grandstanding FBI creep, Wilkerson. That moron was in over his head and incapable of connecting the dots to solve the crime. Now that spunky little blonde babe who'd preceded Wilkerson was one sharp cookie; she'd worried him. But now that she was apparently out of the picture, he breathed a little easier.
Bo grimaced. Still, he hated the thought of killing Dex. The lawman was one of the last local yokels left in this neck of the woods, and Bo felt a natural kinship with him. If only he'd been born into a normal family, then he and Dex might have been best friends. But the key cursed his life, like it had his entire family from the beginning.
There was a sharp rap at the front door. Startled, Bo grabbed his long knife from the kitchen table and placed an ear to the door.
"Who's there?" he growled.
"Me," replied a familiar male voice.
Bo opened the door. "What the hell are you doing here? I told you I never wanted to lay eyes on you again!"
The visitor laid his palm over Bo's hand, and the big man jumped from an electric-like shock. Before Bo could react, his visitor vanished. He staggered to the kitchen table and sat heavily. He felt dizzy. Thickheaded. His eyes refused to blink.
Then suddenly, like a zombie, he rose again and walked stiffly into the living room. What was wrong with him?
Bo unlocked his oak and glass gun cabinet and chose his late-father's .35 caliber hunting rifle for his mission. He then meticulously cleaned and oiled all the moving parts before selecting a scope from a cabinet drawer. He casually polished the lenses until they sparkled, and then attached it to the rifle with small brass screws.
The trance's numbing sensation eventually passed, but the spell remained. Bo's mind was unable to recall even having a visitor, but it obediently complied with the visitor's embedded commands.
He retrieved a box of hollow-point cartridges and stuffed it into his rain jacket pocket. Tonight, one of those savage babies would find a new home inside Dex's corpse.
But that was only the first part of his devious new plan . . . and it even rattled his own chain a bit.
Teddi's angst escalated after Cole's warning. She stepped hesitantly from the airboat onto the dock and glanced again at Cole's grave expression. He wasn't joking. She gulped and strode along the stone path into the dense bayou jungle.
Unseen birds called and cawed in the oppressive late-morning air. Her damp clothes clung to her body and restrained her movements enough to become irritating. Teddi tugged her shirt from her shorts waistband and tied the bottom into a knot, exposing her midriff. Next, she rolled up her sleeves and proceeded deeper into Jackson LaFevre's ominous estate.
Despite the blazing sun, it was night beneath the tangled canopy of tree limbs and silver Spanish moss. She recalled Cole's warning and shouted her name and identification.
"Teddi McCoy! FBI!"
She repeated the shouts every fifty feet or so as Cole had instructed her, but there was no answer. No Jackson LaFevre popping out from behind a tree to shoot her from point blank range. The air and her anxiety became more stifling the deeper into the bayou she went. Her uneasiness wasn't just caused from the prospect that the Cajun psychic wasn't home. It was precipitated from her mounting dread of actually meeting this strange volatile person.
Shrubs cracked and rustled ten feet to her right. Teddi drew her gun and targeted the general area.
"Is that you, LaFevre? If it is, call out or I might accidentally shoot you."
The rustling continued, only closer to her this time. Her thumb disabled the safety. Perspiration painted her face and burned her eyes. Her attempts to blink the sweat away only seemed to pump more of the stinging liquid into her sockets. God, what a nightmare.
The path narrowed and the foliage scraped her exposed arms. The realization that she would have no warning if someone or something jumped out and attacked her only enhanced her trepidation. Her breathing became fast and labored. The heavy rustling was now a mere foot away. And still moving closer.
Her heart leaped to her throat when a menacing growl rose from behind the tangle of bushes. Merely inches away, and yet she couldn't she it. Dammit! She aimed blindly toward the sound. Was the menacing animal actually there, or someplace else? Sounds could be tricky in close quarters like this.
Deep harsh breaths followed each violent growl. Teddi tightened her grip on the gun. The animal sounded big! Instinctively, she retreated as far as she could to give herself room to squeeze off a shot when the creature charged. Sharp branches bordering the opposite side of the path poked sharply into her skin. Three feet was all she was going to get. Not much room to fire off a quick, clean shot. She prayed it was enough.
Then Teddi revised her strategy. The odds were in her attacker's favor at the moment, but she was about to change that. Her finger squeezed the trigger, but her shot went high and wide -- someone had shoved her in the back. Suddenly there were two adversaries!
Before she recovered, a hand reached out of the foliage and quickly ripped the gun from her grasp. She leaped and spun in the air across the confining path toward the growls and prepared to defend herself against her surprise attacker.
"Teddi McCoy from the FBI, is it?" a man's voice asked.
"So what if it is? It's against the law to disarm an FBI agent," she gasped. "You're under arrest."
The man stepped onto the slim path, and they were nearly nose-to-nose. "Really? It seems that the balance of this situation has shifted to your gun and me. You're hardly in a position to enforce your arrest, I'm afraid."
"Give me the gun," she demanded.
"Then the balance would shift in your favor, and for the moment I can't let that happen."
"And why not?"
He held out his empty hand. "I need some identification to prove you're FBI."
"You've got a lot of balls asking for identification when you've got me covered with my own gun."
"Let's not get personal, madam." He snapped his fingers. "ID please."
Teddi fished for her ID in her back shorts pocket as she studied her attacker. The man was tall, about six-three, and dressed in an immaculate white safari outfit. His shoulder-length white-blonde hair was pulled back and tied in a ponytail. His clean-shaven face was expressionless at the moment, but his cat green eyes smothered her like a heavy blanket. Despite his exasperating attitude and her simmering anger, she found him ruggedly handsome -- though she didn't want to dwell on it at the moment.
Teddi handed him her FBI badge.
"Now you have my gun and my badge. Think you could impersonate me now?" she snapped sarcastically.
He perused the badge and gave it back to her. "Promise to behave like the guest you are, and I'll return your gun." He appraised her weapon. "A short-barreled Beretta 92 Centurion, if I'm not mistaken."
Teddi made a grab for her gun, but he was too quick for her and raised it out of her reach.
"Cute," she said, planting her hands on her hips.
"This little 9mm weapon could immobilize someone rather effectively," he continued.
Like you, she wanted to say. Instead, she asked, "May I have it back?"
He bowed slightly. "You are going to forget that arrest nonsense, aren't you?"
Teddi suddenly remembered the menacing growls beside the path. "Just what didn't you want me to shoot over there?" she asked, pointing at the dense shrubbery.
"Why my guard dog, Zeus. C'mon out, boy."
A large black and tan Rottweiler plowed through the greenery and bared its enormous teeth at Teddi.
"Easy boy. Go back home," the man ordered. The two hundred pound Rottweiler bounded away down the path. The man returned the Beretta to Teddi, who was tempted to shoot him right then and there, but she merely holstered it.
"Who are you?" she asked.
"Thought you'd never ask." He bowed again. "Jackson LaFevre at your service."
Teddi regarded him quizzically. Could this courteous man actually be Charlie's volatile psychic? If LaFevre wasn't really a two-legged power keg, then Charlie was a real shithead for portraying him that way. And the same went for Cole and his warning.
"You look like something's puzzling you," he remarked.
"It's nothing."
"I doubt that. Could it be that I'm not the man you expected?"
"You're Mr. LaFevre, aren't you?"
"That's not what I meant."
"Okay. Charlie Simmons and Cole LeBlanc gave me the impression that you were . . . unfriendly. Hostile."
He laughed. "That's what I pay Cole to say to discourage visitors. As far as Charlie goes, I think he was putting you on. Did he send you out here?"
"Yes."
"Hmmm, that's interesting."
"Why?"
He dodged her question. "So why are you here?"
She bristled at his evasiveness. "We need to talk," she informed him.
He smiled. "But we have been talking."
"Are you always this difficult, Mr. LaFevre?"
"Call me Jackson."
"Can we get serious for one second here?"
"By serious, I assume you're referring to the Florida abductions."
She was caught off guard, but tried not to show it. "That's right, I am."
He pulled a slim cigar from his shirt pocket, clenched it between his teeth, and lit it. Silvery smoke clouds drifted from his mouth into the stagnant air. "Let's discuss it over a civilized glass of port, shall we?"
She fanned the smoke away from her face. "Wine gives me a migraine. I'll settle for a cold beer and some air conditioning."
"You're an unusual woman, Teddi McCoy. Blunt, but intriguing."
"That's what my ex-husband says. Now about that beer . . . "
He bowed slightly. "Of course. Please follow me."
Teddi trekked behind him further along the path and hoped that he actually was Jackson LaFevre, and that his brute of a guard dog learned to tolerate her. Fast. Because right now, they both gave her the willies.
Until she had those answers, she would remain chary.
Teddi didn't have any pre-conceived notions about what Jackson's bayou home would look like, but she certainly couldn't have imagined the ramshackle dwelling propped up on stilts that slid into view as they rounded the final crook in the path. Badly weathered shingles covered the small house, the front door sat crooked on orange rusted hinges, and the high-peaked tin roof was a nasty greenish brown. All the windows were painted black. She was tempted to end to her assignment then and there if he forced her to enter it.
He chuckled when he noted her revulsion. "It's much more agreeable on the inside," he remarked.
"Promise?" she asked skeptically. It couldn't be any worse, could it?
He blew a smoke ring. "On my honor."
Jackson led the way up the warped steps to the lofty front porch. He took a remote control unit from his pocket and pressed in a code. The leaning front door swung out, revealing a shiny white steel door. He inserted a key, twisted, and nudged the white door inward.
"After you," he said, extinguishing his cigar in an old milk can lid behind the warped door.
Teddi stared into the blackness and hesitated. "Sure it's safe?"
"One hundred percent sure."
"Okay." Teddi reluctantly entered the house where she was greeted by a cool draft. Jackson flicked up a bank of light switches, and the brass and ceramic table lamps and the lone ceiling fan snapped to life. The interior was stylishly decorated with posh white leather furniture, cane and mahogany tables, extravagant paintings, including one Van Gogh, and an entertainment center consisting of a LCD television, home theater system, stereo components, and an array of speakers. Persian rugs with green and burgundy designs dotted the polished oak floor that appeared clean enough to eat off.
"Satisfied?" he pressed, with a facetious grin.
"Who'd have guessed that the inside looked like this!" she exhaled, relieved.
"That's the whole point. Camouflage. It keeps the bayou burglars away." He depressed another button on his remote, and the far wall slid apart in two sections, exposing a considerable bay window. The sight beyond the glass was picturesque. Teddi stared out at the scenic waterway meandering a hundred feet behind the house. Alligators dotted the sandy banks, while long-legged cranes fished the lazy current.
"I get a bit claustrophobic if I can't look outside," he mentioned. "This place was actually built for one. One bedroom. One bathroom. I added the second bedroom for guests."
"The ultimate bachelor pad, huh?"
"You might say that."
Teddi noticed that the rustic-shingled doghouse beside the waterway was also elevated on five-foot stilts with a wooden ramp leading up to it. Zeus lay with his head resting on his crossed paws inside the screened deck. A doggie door discouraged mosquitoes and snakes from entering. Another doggie door led into the doghouse and provided shelter from storms and stifling hot weather.
"You forgot to mention the single doghouse," Teddi joked. Her uneasiness was gradually melting away.
"Don't tell Zeus," Jackson replied, from the open kitchen. He emptied a bag of twisted pretzels into a bowl, filled a fluted glass with port wine, and popped the tab on Teddi's beer. "Want a glass?"
"Sure, if it's not too much trouble."
Jackson placed their refreshments on a silver tray and set it on the small cane dinette table with a full view of the bayou. Teddi sat on one of the two chairs.
"Thank God for two chairs," she ribbed him.
He nodded and raised his glass. "Here's to first impressions."
Teddi's eyes became slits. "Very funny."
They clinked glasses, and then Jackson said earnestly, "Now to business. I take it that you've hit a few snags in your investigation of the South Florida kidnappings."
Teddi downed a couple swallows of beer. "Try a dead end."
"Ah," he said, as if that explained it all. "And Charlie Simmons asked you to come all the way out here alone to solicit my help. Who's heading your investigation?"
"I am."
He seemed pleased. "And what do you know so far?"
Teddi described the paltry clues they had uncovered to date, but lamented that they were still in the dark as to the identity of the kidnapper and his possible motive.
"His?"
"We figure our perp is a man. Most women couldn't physically handle three hundred pound women."
"That's logical." He sipped his wine, while Teddi threw back another swallow of beer. It tasted great. After her brief trek into the steaming bayou, she was parched.
"Would you mind telling me exactly how you can help me on this case? Charlie didn't fill me in on that minor detail."
Jackson smiled. "That surprises me, because he can certainly tell a whopper of a fish story."
"I didn't know he fished."
"Now and then."
It suddenly dawned on her. "Charlie fishes here."
"Every so often," he answered vaguely. "Now to answer your question. I sense things. The closer I am to the scene of a crime or someone intimately involved with it, the more I sense."
She gnawed a pretzel. "You mean like visualizing pertinent details?"
"Sometimes impertinent details, too. My senses aren't that fine-tuned."
"You mind explaining that?"
He wrinkled his forehead. "Let's just say that there are many presences at a crime scene, both human and inert. Not all of them pertain to that particular crime, but it's impossible for me to filter them out. It's your job to sift through my findings for the relevant information. I'm not a detective. Does that answer your question?"
"I suppose so, but it's difficult for me to understand your powers when I'm sort of a skeptic myself." She paused, waiting for his reaction. When there was none, she continued. "Will you help me find our kidnapper?"
"Can I have some time to think on it?"
Teddi emptied her glass. "Don't take too long. As I explained, if it stops raining, our perp stops abducting. At least that's what happened in 1856. So, we don't know how much time we have left. The rainy weather could break any day."
"I see." He stroked his jaw. "And your new friend Dex Lowe is assisting you?"
Teddi's brows shot up. She'd never mentioned Dex. "How do you know about him? Is this some kind of parlor trick?"
The psychic ignored her impudence. "Is he?" he persisted.
"Okay, he's the police chief of Gator Creek where four of the abductions occurred. Yes, I've been working with him." She studied his grave expression, and out of the blue wondered why he wasn't married. After all, he looked to be in his mid thirties. "How come you're not married?" The question flew out of her mouth before she could stop it. Jesus, Teddi, the guy probably thinks you're another ditsy blonde!
"You're a rather frank person, aren't you?"
She felt her cheeks flush. "I don't beat around the bush, if that's what you mean."
He smiled. "Since this obviously has some bearing on whether you accept me into your investigative fold or not, I'll satisfy your curiosity. I simply haven't found the right woman. I spend most of my time out here, and as you might have noticed, the bayou isn't exactly Daytona Beach teeming with scantily clad, eligible women." He appeared amused. "And why, may I ask, did you divorce Ryan Wilkerson?"
She didn't falter. "Because he's a pompous ass." Now how did he know that?
"Fair enough. Give me a few moments to consider your request."
"Hold on. Why did you want to know about Dex?"
"I've made my decision," he announced swiftly, dodging her curiosity. "I'm going back to Gator Creek with you."
Teddi's enthusiasm was tempered by Jackson's mysterious inquiry about Dex. She stood. "If we're going to be partners on this investigation, we have to be honest and open with each other. No holding back. Now, why did you want to know about Dex?"
Jackson folded his hands. "If we don't reach Gator Creek before nightfall, your friend will be murdered."
The sleek blue bow-rider's inboard engine growled as Jackson deftly guided his speedboat through the bewildering labyrinth of bayou channels at full throttle. He and Teddi were headed for Baton Rouge, the closest city where they could catch an early flight to Fort Lauderdale and arrive in time to save Dex. After docking at a friend's home along the Mississippi River, Jackson arranged for a local taxi to take them to the airport.
"Where's your friend?" Teddi asked, as she brushed her windblown hair inside the bathroom of the expensive house. Her hair had that freshly electrocuted look.
"He and his wife are spending the weekend up in Shreveport for a family reunion. His wife's side of the family, I believe he said. Stewart hates those get-togethers, but he goes because his wife loves them. Keeping the peace, you know."
"Yeah, I do." She shoved the brush back into her purse. "I don't know much about the bayou country, but I thought the swamp water would be too shallow for speedboats," Teddi remarked. "I was thinking more of airboats."
"Normally I use my bow-rider for short hauls, but we've had nearly as much rain as South Florida, and all the rivers and creeks are flooded. Hell, the channel depths are running about ten to twelve feet deep, and they usually run three to four."
"Wouldn't three to four feet give your prop plenty of clearance?"
"Not where stumps and sunken logs are concerned. When the marshland's that shallow, I put the bow-rider into storage and use my airboat."
Now how could a psychic afford those expensive boats? Maybe he was born rich, or used his psychic powers to locate old pirate treasures. Teddi covered her fleeting grin with her hand as Jackson passed by the open bathroom doorway.
As she was putting the finishing touches on her eyeliner, Teddi thought about Dex again. Who'd want to murder him? The kidnapper? Her nerves were fireworks, and Dex wasn't helping. She'd called his cell and office several times, but he didn't answer. Were they already too late? God, she hoped not. Dammit, where was he?
Three elongated car horn beeps blared from the driveway announcing their taxi. Twenty minutes later, their driver turned through a gate and onto a private airfield.
Teddi studied the modest facility as the taxi parked in front of a blue hanger. Must be Jackson's favorite color. "I thought you got us seats on a commercial airliner," she noted suspiciously.
"No, I never said that. I usually charter my flights so they fit my schedule. This time, it was the only way I could guarantee we'd arrive at Fort Lauderdale before sunset," he responded.
"Charlie's going to hit the roof when he sees the charter plane's bill," she groaned.
"No he won't."
Teddi studied Jackson's expressionless face. "And why's that? Because you two are fishing buddies?"
"No. This flight's on me."
She stood outside the yawning hanger entrance. This guy was certainly full of surprises. And money.
Ryan took Teddi's fifth call that afternoon. She was beginning to royally piss him off. "No, that old coot's not around here -- for the fifth time, Teddi! Look, I'm extremely busy, as in I can't waste time talking to you!" he growled, but Teddi ignored his discourtesy and kept on talking. "You're on your way back here by plane? Good for you, Teddi, but I could really give a shit, you know." He paused. "Do what? I'm short enough on manpower as it is without sending an agent out to search for another . . ." He stopped and listened. "All right, I'll have someone checkout his house and have Dex call you if he's there. Fair enough? Good. Don't bother me again!" Ryan slammed down the receiver, and the three nearby agents jumped.
Ryan stormed out of the police station into the parking lot where Carlos Fuentes sat in his patrol car, windshield wipers going intermittently to clear the rain. Carlos was Dex's lone patrolman, and he preferred spending his down time in the patrol car rather than listening to the FBI gringos crack jokes about Teddi McCoy and Dex.
Ryan knocked hard on the window, and Carlos slowly rolled it down. "Hurry up, for chrissakes. It's raining out here!"
"What is it?" Carlos asked coolly.
"Teddi McCoy wants you to get a message to your boss. Tell him that Teddi wants him to call her right away. Got that?"
"Where's Dex?"
"How the Hell should I know? He's not my boss. Why don't you try his home? Do I have to do your thinking, too?" he retorted. God, this guy'd fuck up a wet dream!
Carlos rolled up his window and watched Ryan sprint through the endless rain into the station. Dex's place was ten minutes away. Carlos wished it were ten hours. That way he'd be free of Wilkerson's sarcasm for the rest of the day. The hotshot bastard!
Carlos Fuentes was a birthday shy of thirty. His olive skin and black hair and eyes displayed his proud Chilean heritage. He sent part of his salary back to his family there, so they could someday afford to join him in America. At eighteen, he got lucky and escaped Chile's poverty on a baseball scholarship from Miami University. But he threw out the rotator cuff of his pitching arm his junior year, and that squelched his lifelong dream of playing major league baseball. Fame, fortune, and fun -- all flushed with a single pitch against Notre Dame in a NCAA Super Regional playoff game.
He then switched majors from Foreign Studies to Law Enforcement, met Dex who lectured at Miami twice a year, and the rest was history. Job offered. Job accepted.
Carlos had vowed that he would explore more lucrative big city cop jobs while working in Gator Creek, but Dex was the best boss a guy could have. So he stuck around. Lower pay, fewer headaches, great weather, and an unlimited supply of gorgeous babes. Hispanic babes. The best.
Dex's house was nestled on ten acres at the outskirts of civilization, the eastern edge of the Florida Everglades. His white stucco ranch house sat at the end of a long gravel drive amid a stand of live oaks and towering cypress trees. As Carlos navigated the storm's gloom along the driveway, clumps of dangling Spanish moss resembled fiendish ghosts threatening to assault all trespassers.
Carlos disliked visiting Dex out there unless the sun was shining brightly. The shadowy isolation gave him the creeps. A ground mist swirled around his ankles, as he abandoned the patrol car and marched up to his boss's front door. Fence lizards scattered in all directions, scrambling to safety among the overgrown shrubs flanking the small porch. He rang the bell.
"Hey, boss, it's Carlos. You here, man?"
No response. Carlos waited impatiently. Birds squawked and sang, locusts droned, and two dogs carried on a distant barking conversation.
Carlos knocked this time, but still there was no response. He peered into the windows, but there was no sign of Dex. Finally he hiked around the house to the detached two-door garage out back and glanced through the grimy side window. Spiders scampered away from his rain-soaked face.
"Jesus!" he exclaimed, wildly ripping the strands of the invisible web from his hair, nose, and chin. Man, he hated it out there.
Against his better judgment, he peered inside again. He had to be sure Dex wasn't home. After all, he could be lying on the floor dying of a heart attack or something.
Sheets of hurricane plywood were stacked against the other side of the window frame, blocking his view. Suddenly, he stiffened upon hearing unexpected footsteps. They came from the direction of the swamp. But were they just his imagination?
A wooden walkway built a foot above the marshy land ran the entire depth of Dex's flooded backyard. The final section that led to his dock disappeared beyond a misty jungle marsh of cabbage palms, vines, saw grass, and tall reeds.
Carlos's hands quivered. He crossed himself and stepped onto the rain-slick walkway. If Dex was out there working on his fishing boat without his cell on, the patrolman was going to give him a piece of his frazzled mind!
Mosquitoes buzzed around his ears and dived at his face. He frantically swatted them away until he reached the palmetto scrub. Oddly, the ravenous mosquitoes abandoned their vampire quest and retreated back toward the house.
A light breeze rustled the stiff green palm swords, and the earlier downpour now slowed to a sprinkle. Low black clouds raced westward as if enticing him to follow. He brushed the clammy perspiration from his brow and advanced toward the swamp dock. He relentlessly scanned the algae-green water for snakes and alligators, and his legs grew shaky, but he willed them to go on. If Teddi McCoy needed to speak with Dex pronto-hasto, then it must be urgent.
"Hey, Dex, you out there?" he called quietly, as if fearing to wake the dead. "Quit playing, man. It's me, Carlos."
He heard footfalls thump on the walkway ahead. This time he was certain that it wasn't his imagination. Carlos moved faster. When he reached the dock, he saw a figure standing in the mist at the far end and looking out over the saw grass swamp waters.
The figure turned, but Carlos couldn't identify him. The man raised something to his mouth, and three odd melodic notes drifted through the eerie haze.
Carlos paused. What the hell was Dex doing out there? And why didn't he answer? Before he could hail his boss again, something massive and terrible rose from the green water to his left. Its huge dripping mouth opened and fell over Carlos.
The policeman's bone-chilling shrieks died swiftly, as he was drawn kicking and screaming beneath the water by the powerful creature. The agitated surface suddenly became still, and again a baleful silence blanketed the swamp.
The figure walked briskly along the walkway past Dex's house, climbed into the dark pick-up parked down the road, and calmly awaited Dex's arrival.
Jackson's chartered plane taxied to a stop in front of a row of private hangars that loomed like specters in the depressing gloom blanketing the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood Airport. Warm drops spilled from the low clouds as Teddi and Jackson dashed from the plane into the hangar where a dry limousine awaited them.
"What's this?" Teddi asked hesitantly, pointing to the limo. The bean counter in her brain screamed over budget!
"Transportation."
Teddi perfunctorily surveyed his all white outfit for the umpteenth time; it fascinated her more than bothered her. White linen slacks and shirt, and a white Panama hat. She had never been in the company of anyone like him. In fact, she had never seen anyone like him, except on television reruns of Hawaii Five-O and Fantasy Island.
"I could've called us a cab," she said.
"As a rule, I don't use cabs. They're unreliable."
She shot him a surprised glance. "You're pretty picky."
He merely nodded. "I would tend to agree. Shall we go? Time's a wasting," he reminded her, gesturing at the open rear door. The stiff-postured driver held a pair of clean and precisely folded towels on his arm.
Teddi was taken back. "Such service."
Jackson grabbed a towel and patted his face dry. "Get used to it. Besides, towels are a necessity around here these days."
"No lie. I've been down here over a week and haven't seen more than an hour of sunlight -- total." Teddi took the proffered towel and hurriedly ducked inside the limo.
"Where to?" the driver asked Jackson, as he slipped behind the steering wheel.
"Gator Creek Police Station," Teddi quickly replied.
The driver ignored her request and stared at Jackson.
Jackson shrugged. "You heard the lady."
"Yes sir," he replied, and closed the door.
"I'm quite capable of answering questions that are directed at me," Jackson said reproachfully. "Please remember that in the future."
Teddi slumped back against the plush leather upholstery. "Sorry. I was in a hurry."
Jackson merely closed his eyes and remained silent for the entire drive west to Gator Creek.
They arrived at the police station as the last vestiges of gray light faded to darkness, and Teddi was chagrinned to see Ryan's SUV still parked out front. Her ex-husband glanced up curiously as she and Jackson entered. His interest escalated to vexation.
Ryan abandoned his workstation and greeted them mockingly. "Well, look what the cat dragged in," he said, glancing at Teddi's wet, rumpled clothing. He turned to Jackson. "If I'm not mistaken, you're Swamp Jack." He offered his hand.
Jackson cleared his throat and glowered at the FBI agent.
"Yes, I remember you now. The name's Two-timer, isn't it?" Jackson clasped Ryan's hand tightly. Too tightly.
Ryan's eyes were thunderheads. He yanked his hand from Jackson's vise grip and doubled his fists at his sides.
"Just what's that supposed to mean?" he demanded, his lower jaw thrust out in simian anger.
Jackson smiled and stepped forward until the two men were mere inches from each other. "A meaning as hideous as Swamp Jack." He enunciated the two words with contempt. "I'd appreciate it if you'd kindly refrain from using that moniker."
"Likewise the two-timer bit."
"Agreed. Now, where can we find Dex Lowe?"
Ryan retreated, glowered at Teddi, and then glanced back to Jackson. He roughly grabbed Teddi's elbow and pulled her aside. "What's he doing here?" he sputtered.
"Charlie's orders," she hissed. "If you've got a problem with Jackson, then call Charlie." Suddenly, she remembered that she was still heading this investigation, and that she shouldn't reveal too much of Charlie's strategy. Ryan was the front man, while she and Jackson would do the real investigating behind the scenes. Let Ryan think what he wanted. She knew the truth. No use letting him get under her skin.
Jackson cleared his throat again, and spoke directly to Ryan. "I'm not in the habit of repeating myself, but for you I'll make an exception. Where's Dex Lowe?"
"I haven't seen him," Ryan replied curtly. "You want him, you find him. I'm not at your beck and call."
"Obviously," Jackson commented, with a flash of disdain.
One of the other agents spoke up. "We sent that cop Fuentes to find his boss, but we haven't seen either of them since."
Jackson nodded. "Thank you." He turned to Teddi, who was coming out of Dex's office. "Do you know where Dex lives?"
"Sure."
"Then let's make haste."
The limo's tires crunched as they rolled over Dex's gravel driveway. The driver parked by the front walk and extinguished its lights. The windows were dark. Teddi noticed the patrol car parked on the side of the house. No sign of life there, either. Rain hammered the roof as Jackson opened his carry-on case and withdrew a 9mm Colt semiautomatic.
"Pretty standard stuff," she remarked, as she slid the clip into her Beretta.
"I've made some small modifications."
"Why am I not surprised?" she muttered.
He raked the slide, and a bullet slid into the firing chamber. He then screwed a silencer on the end of the barrel. "You've got a silencer, too, if I'm not mistaken."
"That's right."
"I suggest you attach it. If push comes to shove, we wouldn't want to wake the neighbors," he recommended.
What was with this guy? He was as persnickety as a little old lady about the strangest things, but she complied in the spirit of teamwork. When she had finished attaching the silencer, she held the gun up for his inspection. "Satisfied?"
He managed a slight grin. "Don't point guns --- it's not polite." Jackson switched off the interior dome lights and instructed their driver to park a couple blocks away and wait for a pickup call. The driver responded evenly with a quick bob of his head, as if he dealt with perilous situations every day.
Jackson turned to Teddi. "Let's go."
They bailed from both sides of the limo into the steady drizzle and carefully scanned the immediate area for signs of trouble. Lightning flickered to the east, followed by low rumbling.
"More frigging rain on the way," she groaned.
Jackson tapped her shoulder. "Let's check the house first. Got a key?" he whispered.
Teddi fished Dex's house key from her light jacket pocket, and led the way to the front door. "I'm way ahead of you. I found the key in Dex's desk drawer while you were enjoying Ryan's hospitality," she commented facetiously.
They were drenched by the time she unlocked the door and gave it a cautious shove. The hinges emitted a single squeal before the door rebounded from the baseboard doorstop. She ducked, and Jackson hugged the stucco beside the doorway.
They waited one suspenseful minute before scrambling inside, one breaking left and the other breaking to the right of the open door. Teddi directed a narrow beam of light into the blackness, and after a preliminary sweep, the living room appeared deserted.
Jackson switched on his penlight and edged deeper into the house. He ducked behind a sofa and waited. No sounds. Not even a bubbling aquarium pump. He gestured toward Teddi with a curt wave of his gun. That was her cue to join him.
She was halfway to the sofa, when a familiar voice froze her to the spot. She flattened herself on the carpet.
"Put out those damned flashlights," it ordered. "And get down!"
Thunderclaps rattled the windows of the silent house as Teddi remained motionless on the floor. Lightning strobed, and the brilliant flashes blinded her to the darkness that followed. She could no longer discern the unfamiliar silhouettes in the room. They melded with the intermittent blackness. She raised her head to search for the source of the voice.
"Get down, for chrissakes!" the voice commanded gruffly.
Teddi glanced over to where Jackson was parked behind the sofa. The hair on her neck prickled. He was gone! How did she miss him leaving? His white clothing certainly wasn't a practical night camouflage outfit.
A wind gust rippled her blouse, and she turned toward the open doorway. Lightning flashed and held longer than usual. Long enough for her to witness a cluster of writhing snakes slither across the threshold! Looked like a dozen of them! It was impossible to make out whether they were poisonous or not, but that didn't really matter. She hated snakes. All snakes.
Despite her confining situation, Teddi managed to reposition her Beretta and fire a quick round into the wriggling lump. She fired another round, and then another, until the lightning displayed a flattened, inanimate mass.
The eastern storm finally arrived and pounded a furious tattoo on the roof. The chimes outside the front door gyrated and clanged wildly in the surging wind. Lightning crackled every few seconds, followed by quaking cannonades.
"Identify yourself!" Teddi shouted over the maelstrom.
"Goddamn it, it's Dex!"
"Dex? Why didn't you answer when we called to you?"
"There's someone outside with an itch to kill me, that's the hell why!"
"We didn't see anybody?"
"Well, he's there. Take a look at the wall to your left. You'll see what I mean."
Teddi raised her head and chanced a peek.
"Goddamn it, stay down!"
Teddi chastised herself for being so reckless, but she realized that she was more than a little edgy. First the startling voice --- then, a disappearing Jackson --- and last, a bunch of writhing invaders. What next? Alligators?
Teddi crawled on her stomach around the chair blocking her view of the wall. When she finally succeeded, the incessant lightning flickers made it difficult to see anything, much less evidence of a shooter. The exploding thunderclaps frayed her already raw nerves, igniting an intense flush beneath her skin. She tried to shake off her anxiety and just do her job, but it refused to fade away.
She was acting like a rookie! Anxiety was an invitation to death --- one oversight or impulsive move, and she'd be history. A twenty-one-gun salute to Meathead McCoy. A flag-draped coffin. An eternal dirt blanket.
And Ryan would be laughing his ass off at the cemetery, boasting to his associates that he had warned her . . . had "told her so." That really steamed her.
She vividly recalled his debasing philosophy. She'd heard it many times. "Women and danger don't mix, babe. Better stick to the typical female rigors like avoiding a hot stove, not bullets. Now, be a good girl and resign. We're married now. I can support us both."
Oooohhh!
Teddi's pent-up fury flushed her anxiety, and revived her professional instincts. Teddi scrutinized the wall between lightning bursts. After several moments, the flashes subsided and she saw it. A roaming red laser light --- a laser scope!
"I see it, Dex," she shouted.
"Good gal. Now stay low, and we'll wait this bastard out."
"Do you have any idea who might be out there?"
"Probably the same asshole who murdered my old friend, Ike Noonan, this morning."
"Our perp?"
"Yeah. He must think I discovered somethin' at Ike's that would lead us to him, but I'll be dogged if I can figure out what it is."
"Did you find the 1856 newspaper articles we were looking for?"
"Yeah, and that guy kidnapped hefty women, too."
"Anything else?"
"Nothin' I want our perp to hear about," he replied testily.
"Right," she shot back. "Are you hit?"
"Nah, I'm fine. Just banged my shin on the damned dinin' room table when I hit the deck earlier."
"We can't just lie here. We'll be easy targets if he decides to sneak inside," she argued.
"He won't."
"And how do you know that?" she demanded.
"I do, that's all. Instinct. Just wait him out, Teddi. He'll give up and leave before dawn."
Teddi's eyes followed the moving laser as she vented her frustration. Just lie there? Was he nuts? She recalled the painting hanging behind the desk of her Washington office. Three smirking sitting ducks were seated in front of a bullet-riddled wall. She pictured herself in the painting. A dead duck.
"We're not staying here, Dex," she informed him. "We're going to take the offensive."
"You tryin' to get me killed, Teddi?"
"You know better than that. I have a hunch that the killer wants us to stay put. That's why he's letting us see his laser beam. It's a lame ruse, Dex."
"I saw the damned laser beam outside, too, and I barely made it in here from the garage alive. Bullets were flyin' all around me! I didn't think I could still move that fast."
Teddi bit her bottom lip. "Doesn't it strike you as a bit odd that a man with a laser sight would miss that badly?"
Silence.
"Maybe," he begrudging conceded.
"Then there must be a reason he missed, right?"
"I suppose, unless he's that bad of a shot. Remember, he's used to air guns."
"Bad argument. I've got a better idea."
"All right, you've almost got me convinced. What's on your mind?"
Before she could reply, the red light vanished.Teddi searched the rest of the room for the beam, but she saw nothing. "Damnit!" she swore. "I hope we're not too late!"
"What now?" Dex asked urgently.
"The beam's disappeared."
"Shit. He could be anywhere."
Teddi glanced sideways, and her eyes locked on the laser beam planted on the carpet beside her. Sweat leached through her pores as her angst returned; she gripped her Beretta so tightly that her trigger finger throbbed.
Think, Teddi, think! Remember your training! But she wasn't trained for a situation like this. She was instructed to avoid situations like this. Her only chance of surviving was to pull a John Wayne stunt --- roll and fire . . . without getting killed in the process.
"Don't try anything stupid, Teddi," a faint warning came from the doorway. The cracking thunder and torrential rains nearly drowned out the man's voice.
Teddi squeezed her eyelids shut. There was nothing she could really do now. The shooter had her in his sights. One stupid heroic move now and . . .
She thought of the dead duck.
Teddi guardedly rotated her head toward the speaker, hoping that it wouldn't be her last move. Lightning sliced the sky again, and she was shocked to see a white Panama hat perched on the man's head. Relieved, she rolled on her side.
"Jesus, Jackson. You scared the shit out of me!" she berated him.
Jackson switched off the laser pen. "Stay where you are," he urged. "This isn't over yet."
A shadow approached from the far end of the room; Jackson stiffened, kicked the dead snakes outside, and eased the door shut against the blustery gusts. The shadow was Dex. Before Jackson could warn the police chief to stay low, a side window exploded, peppering Dex with shattered glass. He dropped immediately to the floor.
"Damn!" he groaned.
"Dex!" Teddi yelled over the din from the downpour.
"The bastard winged me," Dex retorted.
"You need a doctor?" she asked, worried.
"A damned head doctor for fallin' for that old distraction ploy!"
"I agree," Jackson muttered. "You might've gotten killed."
Another window exploded, and a bullet whizzed past Jackson's hat, missing it by inches. He tore the hat from his head and sailed it across the room. It landed softly behind the sofa.
Teddi remained flat on the carpet and trained her Beretta on the first blown-out window. Another bullet zinged over her head and penetrated the wall behind her, kicking up gypsum dust. Was the gunman using a night scope to target them? That theory appeared implausible, because the lightning flashes would've blinded the shooter. So how was he doing it?
She rolled over and over until she reached the sofa, and Jackson quickly crab-walked from the foyer and joined her. Teddi glanced over the back of the sofa and chanced a peek outside. The drapes danced and flapped from the fierce winds that whistled through the glassless opening. At first, she saw nothing but wildly waving trees and silvery sheets of rain. Then she saw what she was searching for in the crotch of a nearby tree! A circular glint of a highly polished lens reflected the lightning bursts from about ten feet above the ground. The shooter was utilizing a regular riflescope and the lightning to pinpoint their positions inside the house.
She ducked as a rifle flash rent the blackness around the tree. A bullet knifed through the sofa upholstery above her head and showered Jackson and her with tufts of latex foam filler.
"Our shooter's about thirty feet away and perched in a tree about ten feet off the ground," she whispered to Jackson.
He nodded and motioned with his hand for her to stay put while he crept to the other broken window.
"On my signal, fire at the tree where you spotted him, and I'll follow your shot to the target. Between the two of us, maybe we can pin him down long enough for Dex to make a break for the bathroom to get some first aid," he whispered.
"Dex?" Teddi called softly.
"Yeah, I'm still alive, but I ain't doin' much kickin'," he grumbled.
"Can you move?"
"I'm not bleedin' to death here!" he sputtered.
"When we start shooting, hightail it into the bathroom and tend to that wound," Teddi instructed.
"No problemo."
Jackson waved to her in the winking storm light. Teddi took a few deep breaths, held them, and released each slowly. She steadied her hands and targeted the shooter's position.
One . . . two . . . stand . . .fire!
Teddi hit her mark with her first shots, and Jackson's shots also hit home. She gawked at him, not expecting a psychic to be such an expert marksman. He was full of surprises, and she'd known him for less than a day!
The lens was history, and hopefully the shooter. She caught sight of Dex's dash to the bathroom, and from his quick movements, she deduced that he wasn't badly hurt. She pocketed her empty clip and inserted another.
"You see anything now?" Jackson shouted, scanning the outside for movement.
Teddi stood and checked the area, her gun raised and ready to fire. "Nothing," she replied. Her nerves were settled, and she was all business again.
"Maybe we hit him."
Her gut refused to accept his hasty assessment. "Stay frosty, Jackson," she advised him. "He might've moved to a new spot."
There was a sudden lull in the storm as it moved westward. The gully washer was merely a drizzle now. The incessant drumming on the roof had dulled her hearing, and now the silence was deafening. It would take her ears a minute to recover.
Soft, sharp melodic notes drifted in through the windows. It was difficult to accurately judge the direction of the strange sounds mixed in the strong wind, but she guessed they came from around back. Suddenly, a crisp cracking of wood sent chills scurrying up Teddi's spine. She exchanged puzzled glances with Jackson. The mysterious splintering and snapping were closing in on the house.
Jackson raced to the sliding glass door that opened onto the screened porch in back. "What . . ."
A siren blared in the driveway, mingling with the crunching of gravel. Car doors slammed, and alternating blue and white lights cast revolving shadows inside the house. Shouted orders, compliances, and squawking radiophones masked the cracking wood.
Jackson holstered his Colt and rushed to the wall where one of the bullets was lodged. He snapped open the blade of his pocketknife and furiously dug into the drywall.
The front door flew open, and a familiar stocky silhouette filled the open space.
"Teddi?" he called.
"Ryan," Teddi responded, thankful for his presence. For once.
Ryan brandished his flashlight beam around the room. "Everybody okay?"
"Dex needs some doctoring, but I can drive him to the hospital later. How did you know we were in trouble?"
"The neighbors jammed the police station phone lines with reports of gunfire. I put two and two together and here we are. Did you get a look at the shooter?"
She gestured toward the closest broken window. "No. He hid in a tree out there across the driveway, but I figure he was our kidnapper."
"Really?" Ryan directed the beam to the bathroom doorway.
"Me too," Dex said, holding a bloodstained compress to his left shoulder.
"Why are you two so sure?" Ryan asked, with a skeptical scowl.
Dex gave his head a rueful shake. "'Cause the bastard murdered Ike Noonan earlier today after I left his house," he said. "Our perp must have it in his head that Ike told me somethin' important, but he's dead wrong."
"Maybe our perp was afraid that he might tell you something."
"Could be, but then, why come after me tonight?"
Ryan shrugged and retreated outside to investigate the shooter's tree.
Teddi perked up. "So you found the 1856 articles. Anything interesting in them?"
Dex grimaced from his throbbing wound. "Oh yeah. Tell you later." He glanced down at Jackson. "Who's he, and why the hell is he trashin' my wall?"
She holstered her Beretta and managed a small grin. "That's our new partner, Jackson LaFevre, and I have no idea why he's digging a hole in your wall. But I'm sure he has a good reason."
Dex gritted his teeth against the pain. "He'd damned better!"
Agent Wilkerson's radio squawked, and he lifted it to his ear. "Yeah?"
"This is Young. The area's clear. No sign of the perp."
"Dammit!" Ryan swore. "Well, keep looking. Check the neighboring yards."
"Yes sir."
Ryan's radio squawked again. "Yeah?"
"You'd better come to the back of the house," Adams reported. "You've got to see this."
"Okay, hold on to your knickers, Adams." Ryan trekked along the driveway after finding nothing but a shattered riflescope tied to the shooter's tree. It was blown to hell. But no shooter.
Inside, Teddi directed her flashlight on Jackson and watched him dig a bullet out of the wall. "That's our crime scene investigators' job," she reproved him. "They'll be pissed off that you messed with their evidence."
"Let them piss and moan all they want." Jackson pulled a handkerchief out of his slack's pocket, tucked the flattened slug into it, and stuffed it into his shirt pocket.
"That's official evidence," Teddi reminded him, irritated at his disregard for official procedure.
"There are other slugs in the house that they can examine to their heart's content," Jackson replied dryly. "We need this one."
"Why?"
"Let's head around back. I want to see what Agent Adams turned up in the backyard," he said, brushing her inquiry aside.
Teddi wondered why he was so interested in Adams's discovery; then it hit her. Jackson saw something out back and seemed rattled for a second, before he hurried to the wall to dig out the slug. What did he see? She remembered the cracking wood. Whatever he saw, it must have been big!
Curious, Teddi followed him through the porch and onto Dex's soggy lawn. Dex followed, too, and joined the circle of FBI agents.
"You saw something out there, didn't you, Jackson?" she speculated.
"Just shapes."
"That's a cop-out. I thought we were partners on this case. You know, share and share alike."
Jackson paused several feet from the agents. "Look, I didn't see anything, per se."
"Clearly, you mean? You didn't see anything clearly."
He hesitated. "Yes."
"Was it bigger than a bread box?"
He stepped away from her and pointed at the ground. "Take a look for yourself."
Teddi watched the agents' flashlight beams roam the dark grass. Teddi wrinkled her nose. An acrid odor tickled her nose and burned her eyes. She blinked several times before flicking on her flashlight.
"What kinda smell is that?" Teddi complained.
Ryan swiveled his beam on her face. "Smells like the Everglades to me."
"Aw, what do you know?" she retorted.
"Smells like a musty animal of some kind," Jackson volunteered.
"Yeah, you're right," Dex agreed. "Not quite as bad as a skunk, but pretty damned close."
"You've lived here all your life --- you ought to know what animal that is," Ryan pressed, reacting with his customary ridicule.
"Well, I don't. There's lots of new critters out here, thanks to the dumb asses who buy exotic pets and then let 'em go free where they don't have any natural enemies."
Ryan laughed and wandered deeper into the yard.
Teddi stared at Jackson, who stood out like a sore thumb in his all-white attire. The psychic knows what was out there earlier, or at least has a damn good idea. That was a given. But why did he need that slug? That still puzzled her.
The others drifted toward the Everglades.
"Jesus , Mary, and Joseph!" Ryan cried out. "What the hell did that?"
All the beams fell upon the wooden walkway; it was crushed into the soft watery lawn.
Dex whistled. "Looks like our shooter rode an elephant through here." He turned to Teddi. "That's the loud cracking we heard before the FBI showed up."
Teddi nodded. "I'm going to check out the garage and driveway."
Ryan wrinkled his face. "Why?"
"Officer Fuentes's car is parked there, and there's no sign of him," she replied sharply.
Dex groaned. "Don't bother. He's not around anymore."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Ryan demanded.
"It means that I searched the entire area when I got home, and there was no sign of him . . . except for that." Dex walked to the garage side window, reached under a low shrub, and held up a plastic-covered police cap. "I tracked him as far as the walkway, and that's when the shootin' started."
"So Fuentes might be out there," Jackson reasoned, directing his flashlight toward the break in the mist-shrouded vegetation.
"That's about the size of it," Dex concurred. "But I don't think we'll find him alive."
"I hope you're wrong," Jackson said to lift the sheriff's spirits, but he knew Dex was right. Carlos Fuentes would never be seen again. "Let's take a look. What's out there?"
"First off, we haven't been properly introduced. I'm Dex Lowe."
They shook hands.
"Jackson LaFevre."
"Good to know ya," he said, and gestured toward the scrub break. "My dock and fishin' boat are past that break a hundred feet or so."
Jackson turned to Ryan. "Care to join us?"
The FBI agents exchanged dismayed glances.
"Maybe we ought to wait for morning light, Ryan," the agent called Adams suggested.
Even Special Agent Ryan Wilkerson appeared leery of the swamp. "Good point," he told Adams, then spoke to Jackson. "You take care that you don't trample any evidence out there, you hear?"
"That's the least of your worries," Jackson shot back.
"Really? Why's that?"
"I'd be concerned about finding whatever destroyed this wooden walk. Obviously, it's quite large, so it shouldn't be too difficult for even you to find," Jackson ragged Ryan.
Teddi and Dex chuckled quietly, and Ryan walked away in a huff.
"Let's get moving before the trail's any colder," Jackson told Teddi.
She regarded Jackson as if he were crazy, but she finally consented to accompany him. Dex insisted on coming, too.
"Sure your shoulder can take it?" Jackson asked him. "If not, you can keep Wilkerson and his men company."
"The shoulder'll do just fine, thank you. I'd rather keep the company of rattlesnakes than those folks," Dex joked.
Ryan heard Dex and scowled at his disrespect. "Hey, hold on now . . ."
"Just watch our backs," Teddi warned her ex-husband, "or there'll be hell to pay when we get back to Washington."
Ryan muttered something unintelligible, as Jackson's white-clad form and bobbing flashlight beam suddenly disappeared into the swirling mist beyond the break. Teddi and Dex questioned their sanity, but then followed their new partner.
Teddi carefully walked along the broken walkway and fervently hoped they didn't run into the smelly creature that had caused the mess in Dex's backyard.
A blurry shadow with spiked ears nimbly bounded over the broken walkway ahead of Dex and Teddi like a ghost, and then blended into the gray mist. Teddi started.
"What was that?" she asked breathlessly, holding her Beretta firmly in front of her.
"Just a bobcat," Dex replied. "Real graceful, huh?"
"Yeah . . . if you like graceful predators," she said, a nervous quiver in her voice.
The drizzle lightened, but that repulsive malodor thickened as they approached the black outlines of vegetation where Jackson had vanished moments ago. Strange birdcalls and an occasional roar echoed through the eerie blackness, but Jackson's splashing footfalls were strangely muted.
"No frogs out tonight?" she whispered, noting the absence of the usual croaking chorus.
"I noticed that, too. Weird."
Dex and Teddi were ankle deep in water as they reached the vegetation line of demarcation. Dex directed his flashlight along the walkway ahead of them and frowned when he saw that it lay collapsed in the green bracken water. He tested the damaged underwater planks, and the substructure seemed sturdy enough to hold the both of them. The dock was built in deeper water and he hoped that it was intact. There was no way he was going swimming out there.
"Watch your step," he warned Teddi. "We're walkin' on the same water level as the gators and snakes."
Teddi's eyes widened as she panned her beam from side to side across the algae-covered water, searching for wriggling shapes and beady red lumps on the surface. Black mosquitoes bombarded them and buzzed around their ears as the pair slowly followed the sunken walkway. Teddi's rain jacket protected her arms, but Dex wasn't as fortunate. His bloody gauze and exposed arms attracted the little black demons.
The planks were slime-slick, and Dex nearly slid sideways into the saw grass on two occasions, but he quickly righted himself with outstretched arms like a tightrope walker. He extended a hand to Teddi to help her navigate those sections. After he released her hand, Teddi rapidly retrained her light on the rippling surface, praying that a gator hadn't taken advantage of her brief lull in surveillance to creep within striking distance.
Where was Jackson? Did he locate Fuentes? Was he still alive? She wanted to scream his name to see if he was okay, but that would only give away their position to the shooter if he was still hanging around. She swatted at an especially obnoxious mosquito and trudged forward.
Somewhere ahead, a powerful engine sputtered to life, and its sound moved rapidly away from shore. Dex paused.
"Bastard's getting away," he growled.
"He sure took his time," Teddi observed. "If I were him, I would've left a long time ago."
"Probably holed up on the dock waitin' to get a good shot at yours truly," Dex theorized.
"And when he saw Jackson out there, he took off," Teddi added.
"Let's get a move on, and see if my dock's still standin'."
Neither expressed their trepidations about Jackson falling prey to the shooter's ambush.
They recklessly advanced with a greater sense of urgency until they reached the dock tucked in a thick stand of saw grass. They were both relieved to find Jackson on one knee, digging at a plank with his pocketknife.
Dex and Teddi stepped up onto the dock.
"You're pretty handy with that knife," she commented, glad to be above the alligator-and snake-infested water.
Jackson kept working and didn't respond. Teddi glanced down at the broken edge of the dock illuminated by his flashlight. The wood was speckled with dark splotches.
"Bloodstains?" Dex asked Jackson.
"A bit diluted from the rain, but maybe your lab boys can make an identification, Teddi."
She monitored his motions as he dug out a long screw that held the plank to a two-by-six support. A dark, stringy mass clung to the screw head.
"Any sign of Carlos?" Dex asked.
Jackson nodded at the stained plank. "I'm sorry, Dex, but I think this may be his blood."
Dex wiped his moist eyes with the back of his hand and ambled toward the end of the dock.
"What's that on the head of the screw?" Teddi asked Jackson.
"I don't know, but hopefully your lab boys can identify this, too."
Teddi was exasperated with his feigned ignorance. "You must have some idea," she persisted.
He looked up. "Might belong to Carlos or his killer. Your guess is as good as mine."
"Is it human?"
"Can't tell. It's fleshy tissue, but if you force me to guess, I'd wager that it's not human."
Teddi thought for a minute. "Maybe a gator got him."
"Hmm hmm," he said. "Got an evidence bag on you?"
Teddi checked her jacket pockets and found a couple of small clear plastic pouches. She handed one to him. "That's all I have."
"Good enough." He painstakingly lifted the exposed screw from its setting, dropped it into the pouch, and sealed its zip-top. He stood and handed it to her.
"We need to ID this as soon as possible." Jackson bent and delicately peeled the plank's stained veneer away with his pocketknife. "Hand me that other bag." He balanced the curled strip on the knife blade so he wouldn't contaminate it with his fingers, and slipped it inside the pouch.
Teddi took it and tucked it inside her raincoat.
"You know, Ryan's going to throw a fit because you disturbed his evidence," she said cheerfully.
Jackson frowned. "He had his chance to come out here with us and declined the invitation. We're up against a deadline here --- one that only Mother Nature can control --- so we need to get these analyzed ASAP."
"Did you see anyone out here?" Dex called from the end of the dock. He was barely visible in the coagulating mist.
"Didn't see the guy, but I sensed someone was out there watching us, most likely waiting for you to show up," Jackson replied.
"That's the way I see it, too."
"But if we couldn't see him through this mist, how was he going to get a clean shot at Dex?" Teddi asked, her mind awhirl with possible ambush scenarios.
Dex grinned at Jackson and jerked his thumb her way. "She's always comin' up with bull's-eye questions like that. Teddi, you have a good head on those pretty little shoulders of yours."
Teddi was glad that they couldn't see her blush.
Jackson closed his knife and slipped it into his pocket. "Maybe the shooter had something else in mind for you, Dex."
Dex knitted his brow. "Like what?"
Jackson peered down at the broken dock edge. "I just don't know."
"You're the psychic --- you're supposed to know these things," Dex persisted.
"There's not a lot for me to go on at the moment. Let's get out of here, and maybe I'll think of some way to get the old psychic juices flowing."
Again, Teddi suspected that Jackson was holding back information, and it infuriated her. She glanced at the broken dock. What could've done that to those thick planks? The shooter? Not a chance.
Suddenly, Teddi fervently wanted to be safely tucked into her dry motel bed.
Portable floodlights flooded Dex's yard with daylight as Dex, Jackson, and Teddi splashed into view on the battered walkway. FBI agents scurried over the crime scene like a swarm of black ants, silently scrutinizing, collecting, and marking all possible evidence. Teddi located the supervisor of the local FBI crime scene investigative team, Carl Landers. He was easy to spot. He was tall and lanky, and his physical movements were awkward. But, he was a whiz in the lab.
Teddi led him away from the others.
"What's up, Special Agent McCoy?" he asked gruffly, upset at the interruption of his long-established routine.
Teddi removed the two plastic pouches from her raincoat pocket and pressed them into his hands. "I need you to run tests on these samples yesterday," she emphasized.
His brows shot up. "Clues?"
"Absolutely. We found them out on the dock where we believe Deputy Carlos Fuentes was murdered earlier today," she explained.
He gestured toward the lighted yard. "But what about all this? There's so much area to cover yet," he complained.
"Let Vince run the show. I need you to run with these now. They're important."
"But what about Special Agent Wilkerson? He'll have my hide if I leave before we've completed our search."
"Leave Ryan to me. Now get going," she ordered. "Sneak around the dark side of the house so Ryan can't see you leave."
Carl appeared wary.
"And Carl?"
"Yes."
"Call me the second you have results, and I mean the second!"
He nodded once and jogged around Dex's house.
Ryan sauntered up to Teddi. "Where's Carl going?" he demanded.
"Carl's running an errand for me," she replied stiffly.
"You have no right to . . ."
She planted her hands on her hips. "I have every right. This is my investigation, and I'll give the orders."
"Like hell you will," he snarled.
"We're supposed to be working as a team here, Ryan, but make no mistake about it, it's my investigation. You're the show-and-tell guy who reports our progress to John Q. Public, while I direct the show from behind the scenes. Just do your job and lose the whining. We have a real bad guy to catch," she retorted, aware that she had just revealed Charlie's confidential strategy. "Keep that in mind. The investigation's what's important here, not your petty grievances. Don't lose sight of that. Okay?"
He spun without speaking and joined the other agents.
Jackson walked up behind her. "High maintenance, isn't he?"
"Very," Teddi responded, relieved that this inevitable confrontation was behind her. "C'mon, we've got to get Dex to a hospital and you to a motel."
He punched in a speed dial number on his cell phone and asked his driver to bring the limousine around.
Jackson quietly bickered with the night manager at Teddi's motel for ten minutes, until the beleaguered man finally caved to his guest's request. Jackson handed the frazzled man a credit card, and the deal was officially consummated.
"Tough sell?" Dex asked, with a glimmer in his red-rimmed eyes.
Jackson chuckled. "Let's just say that I outbid the competition in this capitalistic venture, and we now have a center of operations in the one and only business suite on the top floor."
Teddi grinned. Jackson was certainly full of surprises.
"And, Dex, I insist that you share the suite with me." When Jackson saw that Dex was about to object, he raised his hand. "I won't take no for an answer. It'll be more difficult for our friend to eliminate you here among all these potential witnesses."
"Well, if you put it that way . . ."
"Then it's settled. I suggest we head up that way now. The clock is ticking."
The elevator slowly conveyed them to the fifth floor and shuddered to a stop.
Jackson pointed down the left hallway. "This way, I believe."
He opened the doors on the spacious three-room suite. An elegantly appointed central meeting room separated two bedrooms with connecting bathrooms. Teddi removed her holster and laid it on the cherry conference table.
"Cozy," she said.
Dex laughed. "Yeah, like camping out at Madison Square Garden."
"I've arranged for my driver to pack some of your belongings and move them here, Dex. I hope you don't mind."
Dex patted his bandaged arm supported by a blue sling. "Not at all. I couldn't manage to bring much myself anyway, with this bad wing and all."
"Good. Now let's get down to business. What's on the agenda, Teddi?"
She had to give Jackson credit. He yielded to her official authority, but he clearly had slipped into the leadership role right before her eyes. Pretty slick, but not slick enough. She was on to him.
She smiled at Jackson. "Could you check the fridge for a bottle of cold water?" she asked sweetly, pleased at reclaiming some of her usurped authority.
"Could you make that two?" Dex added, winking knowingly at Teddi when Jackson wasn't looking. "I'm parched from this damned pain medicine that hospital doc gave me."
Jackson reluctantly checked the refrigerator and returned with three bottles and one glass. He handed the glass and one bottle to Teddi. "Still prefer a glass, Boss?"
"Thanks," she said, impressed with his memory. She was learning that Jackson didn't miss much. "Now, as I see it, we should divide our efforts according to our individual strengths. I'll handle communications with the FBI labs and research staff. Dex, you be the source of any local input we need. And, Jackson, you do . . . what you do best."
"Which is?" Dex plied, and took a long pull from his bottled water.
"Seeing crimes, past and future," he replied in a low voice.
Dex's mouth dropped open, and a small trickle of water dribbled down his chin. "No shit?"
Jackson's face was stone. "No shit."
"All right, we've got that over with. Now, Dex, fill us in on your visit . . . make that your first visit to Ike Noonan's place," she prompted.
He hastily brought Jackson up-to-date. "Teddi researched a possible connection between our crime to another one that occurred right here back in 1856. She found a couple newspaper articles in the old Everglades Press. I dug up a couple more articles over at Noonan's. The timin' of that old crime was the same as it is now. Late spring and early summer. And, the 1856 kidnappin's involved heavyset women as well."
Teddi's face brightened. "Really! That pretty much nails the connection between these two crimes, even though they're separated by a hundred and fifty years." She realized that she had interrupted Dex. "Sorry, please go on."
Dex grinned. "No problem, Teddi. As I was sayin', the kidnappin's started with an unusually heavy rainy season, and ended a few weeks after the rain stopped and the local floodwaters receded."
"Not when the rain stopped?" Jackson interrupted.
"Uh, no."
Jackson looked puzzled. "Go on, please."
Teddi studied the psychic's expression. What was going on behind that southern-fried mask of his?
"Then, Ike related a local Indian fable about a monster that roamed the Everglades during that same time."
Was it her fatigued imagination, or did Jackson's attention sharpen at the mention of the reported monster?
Dex recited the tale, and when he finished, he asked if there were any questions.
"Sounds preposterous," Teddi said skeptically. "Blaming those disappearances on a swamp thing."
Jackson remained thoughtfully composed.
"Your turn, Jackson," Teddi said. More lies again? Or finally some truth for the first time?
He removed the handkerchief from his pocket and laid it carefully on the table. He unfolded it as if it contained a priceless treasure. In the center lay the bullet he had crudely dug out of Dex's living room wall --- the bullet that nearly scrambled Teddi's brains. He then dropped the bullet into the open right palm and faced his companions.
"I'm going to see if this bullet has a story to tell me."
Dex regarded him suspiciously. "Just what kind of story are you talkin' about?"
"A story about the shooter."
Dex looked at Teddi. "This I've got to see."
"Give him a chance," she shot back.
Dex shrugged.
"This might not be pretty," he warned them. "Sometimes when I'm in a psychic trance, I scream and convulse like a crazed jumping bean if the sight is violent." He paused. "With most FBI investigations, they usually are."
"We're ready," she said.
"Wait!" Dex said. "If you get all riled up, should we roust you?"
"Under no circumstances should you interfere with my visions. My mind could be permanently frozen in that revelation until I die," he answered sternly.
"Like a human vegetable," Teddi said.
Jackson scowled at her.
Dex bowed his head slightly. "Understood. Do your stuff."
Jackson reclined on the couch, eased his eyelids shut, and closed his fingers tightly around the bullet.
With shallow breaths, Dex and Teddi nervously anticipated Jackson's psychic spell.
They didn't have long to wait.
Jackson's mind was a blank screen at first; then, it exploded into a meaningless kaleidoscope of vivid fluid colors converging and blending with each other. The movement mesmerized him, relaxed him. The colored swirls continued to writhe and flow randomly, forming a multitude of beautiful and ghastly shapes, each image lasting less than a second. There was no sound. No smell. No feeling. No time.
Not yet.
The colors dimmed as if a black cloud blocked the sunlight. The blues dimmed to grays, the ruby reds to shades of burgundy, the yellows to dirty whites, and the greens to hazels. The liquid motion slowed by degrees until it eventually froze, creating a vague still life of a sparse thicket. He strained to create shapes from the ambiguous landscape, but they remained meaningless.
Suddenly, the wooly veil lifted from the scene like a theater curtain rising on the first act. An intense light glared from the growing opening, nearly blinding him, and then there was abrupt twilight. The trees remained silhouettes. Outlines. Barely distinguishable in the burgeoning nightscape.
Jackson strived to visualize details in the new lighting, but it was slow in coming. First, a hand appeared. It cast a pencil-thin ruby beam into the gloom. The vision widened. Jackson now saw that the hand was attached to a human silhouette --- a very large male --- who clutched a rifle in his other hand.
Jackson understood the psychic process and remained patient. The experts called it revelatory osmosis. It was akin to watching a silent movie with a supernatural knowledge track.
He immediately recognized the silhouette as the shooter at Dex's place. No reasoning required. He just knew.
The scene sharply shifted to a cemetery on a foggy hillock softly illuminated by a primrose moon. Grave markers dotted the dismal setting like sooty stains. Atop the hillock sat a sizeable brick mausoleum, overseeing the other gravesites like a menacing overlord. Unkempt monochrome grass sprouted between the markers like stubborn cowlicks, and a fractured stone path split the cemetery and wound its way up to the broad mausoleum door.
The scene skipped to a different night at the same cemetery. Earlier than his previous vision. Jackson seemed to be drifting back in time.
He watched the silhouette --- the shooter --- push a wheelbarrow along the path up to the mausoleum. With considerable physical effort, the shooter maneuvered his cumbrous cargo over the threshold. The blustery winds stripped the tarp from the wheelbarrow and revealed a hefty woman's naked body, glistening with perspiration --- no, she was painted in blood. Her own blood. The shooter was the kidnapper!
He shivered mentally. Where was this place? An old cemetery shouldn't be too difficult to locate in the area. After all, how many could there be?
A familiar, terrific stench assailed his senses, like the one they had encountered earlier in Dex's backyard. But there was more than the horrific odor --- evil wafted from the mausoleum opening. Dread sparked his nerves and prickled his flesh.
The shooter shoved the wheelbarrow deeper into the mausoleum and closed the door. All went black. End of act I.
A feeble moaning drifted to his ears from the ancient burial chamber. Pleading so soft that it was barely audible. He might've considered it a figment of his active imagination, but the revelatory osmosis instructed him otherwise. The pleas were real. The blood-painted victim was real. And the danger was real.
Sweat dotted his face. Horror stabbed his spine --- her horror. He was now experiencing the victim's suffering.
A daylight visual scene suddenly displaced the physical encounter. Jackson had no idea where he was in time.
Teens of all ages wearing disparate fashion styles filled the landscape. He listened to their raucous laughter and playful screams, crude jokes and taunts, and reckless gossip and cell-phone chatter. Asphalt fields cultivated uneven rows of cars, pickups, and motorcycles. Cigarette smoke drifted from cracked car windows, and a stand of oaks shadowed the parking lot. The grounds crew finished mowing the grass inside the football stadium, and student volunteers started painting the gridiron lines.
He was observing life at a high school. But which one? No information was forthcoming. Did this scene occur in the past, or was it yet to happen? Again, no information was forthcoming. His revelatory osmosis track faded, and that was strange.
Were his psychic visions being partially blocked by the shooter? By someone else? Or, was the fired bullet he dug from Dex's wall too trifling for him to obtain a strong psychic vision?
Jackson sensed that some aspect of this visualization was off kilter, but what? Why? How? No information was forthcoming.
He tried in vain to discover the name of the high school from signs on the campus buildings, vehicle bumpers, or even student tattoos. Zippo. But the word quit wasn't in his vocabulary. He mentally strained to check out the wristwatches or pocket watches worn by passing students --- anything that would indicate the time of the setting. Nada.
Then Jackson was abruptly transported to another place. Time. Shrieks filled his new world. Bloodcurdling shrieks! He was adrift in an obsidian sea, isolated from the world. The sane world. The hair stiffened on his scalp as if it were electrically charged. A gamy, rancid smell embraced him. That familiar malodor again. Bile erupted in his throat.
He suddenly realized --- no, knew --- that he was inside the blood-smeared woman who had been in the wheelbarrow --- only they weren't inside the mausoleum, but beneath it! Her senses were now linked with his.
Beyond her shrieks, Jackson heard the muted splashing of waves. They were beside a body of water. It was a lake. The smell was even thicker there. His eyes watered, and his throat constricted against the rising bile.
He groped blindly in the miserable darkness for an exit. An escape hatch. Any psychic doorway to flee the horrifying isolation. His panic escalated with hers, but everything he touched were seamless, clammy stone walls --- tomb cold.
He stopped. Something was approaching. Splashing in the lake. Something big! Her shrieking ceased, and he felt her go numb with shock. Hopelessness. Terror.
His mouth was dust, and his heart a revved engine. His eyes were worthless in the blackness, which only heightened his alarm. His primal fear of the unknown.
With each passing moment, the splashing grew nearer --- more ominous. He sensed an entity so evil, so hostile, that the woman's death was imminent. If he didn't sever his psychic bond with the woman soon, his own life would be in jeopardy, too.
Without warning, two flaming orange eyes appeared beside him! The breath of thousands of corpses fanned his face and rustled his hair.
Jackson waited for the inevitable.
The hostile eyes glared at him.
And Jackson just waited.
A mouth opened below the eyes. Jagged rows of enormous teeth enveloped him, and the powerful jaws closed against his helpless form!
He threw his hands over his face and screamed! Screamed! SCREAMED!
Sudden pounding on the motel suite door startled Dex and Teddi, and they nearly jumped out of their skins. She plucked her Beretta from its holster and peered out the peephole. The irate motel manager glared impatiently at the door, waiting for a response.
Teddi cracked open the door, leaving the brass chain in place. "Yes?" she asked gruffly.
"Look, Miss, I've received several complaints about god-awful shouting and screaming in here, and I . . ."
"It won't happen again."
The manager leaned to his right and attempted to peer through the crack into the room. "I heard them myself, and they sounded like tortured screams." He cleared his throat. "We don't permit that sort of conduct in this establishment," he informed her.
"I just told you that it won't happen again. Good night!" She eased the door shut so as not to disturb Jackson, but he was already conscious and speaking quietly with Dex. His linen shirt and slacks were drenched with perspiration and adhered to his firm, muscular body. Teddi hadn't noticed that before.
Jackson glanced in her direction. His face was ruddy and stressed.
"Welcome back," she said softly. "You gave us quite a scare there for a while."
He attempted a smile, but his lips remained rigid. "Ditto."
"Teddi, Jackson and I could both use a shower and a hot pot of coffee. Let's reconvene here in an hour," Dex announced.
She nodded and checked her watch. "About two then?"
"That'll be fine. Thanks."
She heard Dex speaking to room service about that pot of coffee as she closed the door.
Ryan returned to the Gator Creek police station after one that morning, completely exhausted and annoyed. He gnashed his teeth as he speed-dialed the FBI's crime lab in Washington --- the geek department never closed. Perry Anders answered Ryan's call on the third ring, and Wilkerson inquired about their progress on identifying the drug used on the dead black kid last night. Anders hemmed and hawed.
"We've identified nearly all of the pharmacopoeia and reagents, but there's one ingredient that is unknown to our computers," Anders explained, between yawns.
"I don't have weeks here, Perry. Lives are at stake. Can't you make a guess?"
"We don't guess here," Anders replied sharply, displeased that Wilkerson would even think that his lab would fudge results.
"You know what I mean ---give me an educated guess, dammit!"
Anders blew his nose. "It appears," he emphasized, "as if the purpose of this chemical is to consign a victim to a state of paralysis, while leaving the mind cognizant of all activities around it. We've evaluated similar drugs with those characteristics."
"Could the damn stuff kill someone?"
"I don't know, Ryan, since I don't have a final report on the unknown toxic substance. The missing chemical component has similar properties to other toxic venoms that are in our database, but we can't pinpoint the source. Once we determine that, I can hand you a full report, minus the educated guesses," he said dryly.
"Fax me a list of those chemical components so I can do some digging around here for a source," Ryan demanded.
"I can save you the trouble. There are only three companies that legally sell most of these highly irregular pharmacopoeia supplies, and one of them is located in Miami. Got a pencil?"
"In my fuckin' hand. Shoot."
Anders read off the address and phone numbers for AGM Chemical Supply.
"Got it. Perry, I owe you one."
"Several is more accurate," Anders reminded him, and hung up.
Ryan smacked his palm with his note pad. The other agents glanced at him hopefully.
"A break?" Adams ventured.
"You bet! I know how that kidnapping prick is immobilizing his victims," Ryan replied.
"Gonna tell Teddi about it?" another agent asked.
Ryan's mouth spread into a shit-eating grin. "Sure, right after we arrest the prick." He flipped his cell phone open again. "Gotta wake a federal judge and get us a search warrant."
Teddi soaked in her tub for a good half-hour, and then toweled herself dry and paced her motel room naked. She concentrated on organizing the case's random clues, so she'd be ready for their meeting at two. Another day would be dawning soon, and that more than likely meant another abduction.
Dex and Jackson appeared refreshed when she entered the suite, although Jackson's complexion remained flushed. A silver tray was loaded with glazed donut holes, croissants, bagels, cream cheese, an assortment of jellies, and a massive silver coffee urn. Teddi poured herself a cup of coffee and added a healthy splash of cream.
"Shall we get started?" Dex asked, sounding like a kid on Christmas morning who was dying to steal a peek under the tree. His long-repressed curiosity concerning Jackson's psychic adventure had swept away his fatigue.
Teddi and Jackson joined Dex at the table.
"Let me describe what I saw in my visions without interruptions," Jackson said.
"Fair enough," Dex agreed readily.
"First, Dex's shooter and the kidnapper are one and the same. I watched him set up the laser pen distraction at Dex's house, but before I could see more, I was whisked away to an old foggy cemetery. Sitting at the top of the cemetery hill, I saw a brick mausoleum. I have never felt so detached from the world as I was there.
"I witnessed our perp pushing a wheelbarrow to the mausoleum entrance, and let me tell you, he's a big man. His load was covered with a tarp, but when he opened the door, the wind blew away the tarp." Jackson closed his eyes and massaged his brows. "There was a naked woman inside, and she was painted with her own blood."
Teddi and Dex exchanged troubled glances.
"I couldn't determine if she was dead or alive at that point, because she wasn't moving," Jackson continued. The emotional strain of reliving his nightmare was slowly eroding his remaining energy. "The kidnapper shoved the wheelbarrow into the mausoleum and closed the door behind them. I was effectively shielded from his subsequent activities. I might add, I'm glad." He wiped budding perspiration from his forehead with a napkin.
"Then, I heard a woman's cries for help, but her voice was so weak, I wasn't sure if they were real. Suddenly, I just knew they were, and that she was very much alive."
How awful! Teddi thought.
"I was abruptly transported from the dark cemetery to a high school."
Dex's eyes lit up, but he remained tight-lipped.
"I tried in vain to identify the name of the high school, but the damn vision dumped me in a bad spot and wouldn't let me roam the campus." He paused and sipped his coffee. It was tepid. "Time wise, I think the cemetery visit occurred in the past, but I'm not certain when the school vision took place --- my guess would be the future, but I'm not sure why. Call it a hunch," he said. "That's about it."
Teddi eyed him suspiciously. "What happened to the painted woman?"
"I don't know," he lied, not wanting to revisit the orange eyes and his impending demise. "I was at the high school before I could . . . see."
Dex looked at Teddi. He wasn't buying Jackson's last answer, either. "Then what in the Sam Hill were you carryin' on about?" he pressed.
Jackson played ignorant. "I was? I . . . don't recall."
"Screaming, sweating, flailing your arms --- the whole nine nightmare yards," Teddi added.
"I don't remember," he countered firmly.
"Maybe it'll come to you later," Teddi said flatly. Jackson was a strange and secretive man. What was he refusing to tell them? And why? She trusted that his silence wouldn't jeopardize all three of their lives.
But she was having trouble believing that at the moment.
"Would you recognize the high school in your vision if you saw it?" Teddi asked.
Jackson frowned. "Maybe . . ."
Teddi retreated downstairs to her motel room, grabbed her notebook computer, and made it back to the suite inside four minutes. She plugged the computer into the suite's Internet connection and typed in Florida, Broward County High Schools.
"You're certain it was a high school, right?" she asked.
"I think so, yes. The kids were older."
"Sure it wasn't a college or community college?"
"The kids weren't that old or mature," Jackson replied wearily. His voice had a biting edge to it. He was still shaken from his psychic experiences.
Teddi typed in several more commands until she achieved the desired results: a picture tour through Broward County's high schools.
"Take a look, Jackson," she said. "I'll only scroll through the exterior shots, because that's what you saw."
He scooted his chair alongside her, while Dex leaned over her opposite shoulder.
"I'm ready. Go ahead," Jackson said.
Several schools scrolled past without recognition. Dex yawned. His childish anticipation had crashed, and his bullet wound began throbbing again. Teddi remained nonplussed. They had to find the school. It must be important, somehow, to their investigation.
"Didn't know Broward had so many high schools," Jackson complained.
Twenty minutes and eleven schools later, Jackson stiffened and tapped the screen.
"That's the one," he exclaimed, exhilaration displacing his weariness. "Let's take a look farther left," he instructed.
Teddi scrolled left, and Jackson's index finger stabbed the screen again. "There it is --- the football stadium! The parking lot's over there --- good --- and the oak trees border the lots here. Now we're getting somewhere. Good work, Teddi!"
"Crystal River High School," Teddi read the caption beneath the panoramic view.
Dex straightened and rapidly dialed a number. Teddi shot him a "what's up?" glance.
"Rousing Sheriff Stark from his royal slumber." Dex grinned. "Hey, James, it's me, Dex."
James Stark's thick voice muttered a greeting. "This better be friggin' important, Dex. I had a late night and just got to bed."
"Who was the lucky lady?"
He responded with a hoarse laugh. "You know me too well. Now what the hell's going on?"
Dex described Jackson's psychic trance and received a skeptical clucking from Stark. Dex ignored it and added that Jackson had positively identified the high school where the kidnapper might strike next.
"Don't keep in me suspense, Dex. Which school was it?"
"Crystal River High School."
"Shit. Our new one out in Tamarac."
Dex raised his fist triumphantly and nodded toward the others. "That's out in our kidnapper's neck of the woods by the Sawgrass Expressway."
"No shit, Sherlock. So what do you want me to do?"
Dex sighed. "You tell me. It's your ballpark."
"All right, I'll dispatch a squad of undercover cops to infiltrate the school and have SWAT standing by a few miles away so they won't spook the kidnapper. You want in on this, Dex?"
"Me and the FBI."
"Not that jerk-off Wilkerson?"
"No. Special Agent Teddi McCoy and her team."
"How many's on her team, bro?"
"How many on your team, without Wilkerson?" Dex asked Teddi.
"A dozen, ready to roll on my command."
"She says about a dozen."
"The dirty dozen, eh?" He chuckled. "With you, that makes a baker's dozen --- bad luck, buddy," Stark ribbed his old friend.
"I've lived with worse."
"Like your ex-old lady." He laughed.
Dex shook his head. "It doesn't get much worse than that, James."
"Amen. Let's meet in my office in an hour to fix any snafus that might develop."
"We'll be there."
"Oh, Dex."
"Yeah."
"Bring the psychic. If this operation goes bust, I want the scapegoat's ass right beside me so I can feed it to the media sharks."
Wilkerson woke a federal judge at his home in Miami and asked him to issue a search warrant for AGM Chemical Supply. The drowsy judge swore thickly in Spanish, but listened to the agent's evidence for the search. Finally, he agreed to fax a signed federal warrant to the Gator Creek Sheriff's Station. Afterward, Agent Mack Jensen, a tall thirty-something with his muddy brown hair neatly parted and combed, phoned the surprised and anxious president of the chemical supply company and arranged to meet him at his corporate office within the hour.
AGM Chemical Supply was tucked into an industrial park, a block from the beach. Sixty-four-year-old Len Goldstein waited for them beneath an umbrella in the empty parking spaces fronting his business. His anxious eyes stared out from sun-etched wrinkles when the two black Suburbans jounced to abrupt stops on either side of his Cadillac Escalade.
Wilkerson slid from his shotgun seat in the first Suburban, introduced himself, and shoved the warrant into Goldstein's quivering hand.
"What's this all about, Special Agent Wilkerson?" he asked.
"I'll explain on the way inside."
Moments later, Goldstein turned off the security alarm and unlocked his office door. "Please, come in and we'll search for the buyer of these chemicals." He switched on his computer, waited for it to boot, and then typed in the chemical names.
Goldstein's office was cheaply decorated with a cluttered metal desk, six four-drawer cabinets, a half-dozen cheap prints hanging askew on the white plastered walls, a beveled-glass wall mirror above the water cooler, and a faded and distressed coat tree in the corner behind the office door.
Within a minute, his face relaxed. "I've located the customer. Oh, it's him."
"Him?"
"Yes, the buyer. It's Bo Swinson from Demon Key. A very unpleasant man, and that's putting it mildly."
"How so?"
"He's rude, belligerent, and always cruising for a fight. If you just look at that man the wrong way, he wants to knock your block off."
Wilkerson knew the type, and he would be more than happy to kick that chickenshit kidnapper's ass before cuffing him. "Got an address on your happy camper?"
Goldstein printed out the entire sales entry, which included Swinson's address, and gave it to Wilkerson.
The agent summarized the information aloud to his companions. "Swinson purchased these items a year ago, ostensibly for treating animals. He paid cash."
"Let's go get him," Agent Adams urged, raring to go.
"We will, but we're going to do it by the book."
"Yes, sir."
Wilkerson looked askance at the bottom of the page and glared at Goldstein.
"What the hell kind of address is this?" he barked at the cowed business owner.
Goldstein stuck his hand across the Steelcase desk. "Let me see." The old man perused Bo Swinson's address. "Demon Key. Hmmm."
Wilkerson waited impatiently.
"It's a small island in the Everglades, just west of Gator Creek and the Sawgrass Parkway." Goldstein opened a desk drawer and rummaged through it. "I've got a map here somewhere."
Wilkerson stood. "Thanks, but we'll check it out." With that, he turned and led the three agents outside into the drizzling rain. "Jensen, get the Broward County sheriff on the phone."
"At this hour?"
Wilkerson glowered at him. "Just do it."
Jensen dialed the number from inside the Suburban and handed the phone to his boss.
The sheriff picked up the phone on the first ring. "Stark here."
Wilkerson was surprised that Stark was so alert for three in the fuckin' morning.
"Special Agent Wilkerson here. I've got the name of our kidnapping suspect, and out of courtesy, I'm inviting you along for the arrest," he explained.
"I see," Stark replied vaguely, playing his cards close to the vest. No use mentioning the Crystal River High School operation to the creep. "Who's your suspect?"
"Bo Swinson. The guy lives on some small-ass Everglades island."
Stark's mouth dropped open. "Yeah, on Demon Key."
"You know it?"
"Damn right I do." He paused. "Bo Swinson. I can believe it."
"You know him?"
"Yeah, sort of. His family's notorious for their weird behavior, but Bo's just an out-and-out bully. Has been since elementary school."
"You went to school with the guy?"
"My younger brother did, a long time ago. The bastard's a racist pig. Beat up my brother and sent him to the hospital for accidentally bumping him in the school hallway," Stark explained, the old anger rising. "Said niggers should watch where they're going."
"Sounds like a real humanitarian."
"Oh yeah."
"We're making the bust at dawn. If you and your SWAT team want to tag along, meet us out at the edge of the Everglades by five-thirty."
Stark doubled his free hand into a fist. "We'll be there."
"Hey, I never said the kidnapping would take place this morning. Hell, it could be a month from now, for all I know," Jackson protested.
Dex winked at him. "Have a little faith, huh? I have a hunch it'll be this morning, and if I'm wrong . . ."
Dex's cell phone vibrated in his pocket before he could finish, and he quickly answered it. It was James Stark.
"Yeah, James?"
"I'm afraid we've got to cancel our meeting."
"You're kidding?"
"Afraid not. I just got off the horn with that SOB Wilkerson, and he's identified our perp."
"How?"
"He didn't volunteer the information, and I didn't ask. Frankly, it's the FBI's ass if they screw up the arrest, so I'll play it by ear. If it's a good bust, then I'll insist on the particulars."
"But what about our Crystal River High School lead?"
"Looks like the bastard'll be arrested before the students even arrive at school. The students will be safe. That's my only real concern."
"I hope to God you're right about this."
"You worry too much."
"Who's the perp?"
"Bo Swinson."
"Oh, Jesus. Mean as a rattlesnake."
"The one and the same. Want to hop on the arrest bandwagon?"
He glanced at Teddi and Jackson, who were studying him intently. "I'll be there."
"Good man." Stark gave Dex the time-and-place details and hung up.
"What's the matter? You don't look too happy," Teddi asked.
"That was Stark." He rapidly related their conversation.
Nobody spoke for a long minute.
Finally, Jackson stood and paced the room. "Wilkerson's making a mistake," he said finally.
"Ryan wouldn't move on an arrest without solid evidence," Teddi said softly. "It must have something to do with the chemicals the lab identified in the dead boy's blood."
"Even so, he's wrong," Jackson persisted.
"Maybe, and maybe not," Dex added, "but I'm going to be out on Demon Key just the same."
"Something's wrong with the whole scenario," Jackson carped, his face beet red. He stood staring out the rain-streaked window at the empty street below.
"What do you mean?" Dex asked, as he made sure his 9mm gun was loaded and ready for use.
"My visions are normally accurate to a fault. I saw something at Crystal River High School that involved our kidnapper, not in a swamp . . . at your Demon Key."
Teddi joined Jackson by the window. "I hate to say this, but I know Ryan, and he's very seldom wrong. He meticulously does his homework, and makes certain that all his t's are crossed and i's are dotted before he makes a move. If he says Bo Swinson's our guy and can be found out on Demon Key, then I have to believe him," she stated, with little enthusiasm.
"Kills you to say that, doesn't it?" Dex said, staring hard at her.
"More than you know. Looks like he wins again."
Jackson stepped away from her. "I didn't realize that FBI investigations were competitive these days," he scolded her. "I thought that we all win when the bad guys are brought to justice."
"Yeah, but you don't know Ryan."
"I guess I don't know you, either." He pivoted sharply toward Dex, who was reaching for the doorknob. "Dex, I know we just met a short time ago, but trust me when I say that Wilkerson is wrong about this. He will not find Swinson on Demon Key."
The sheriff shrugged. "Sorry, I gotta go. It's my responsibility to follow up on all leads in my neck of the woods. Part of the small-town cop's job, I guess. Everybody thinks that we don't know a hill of beans about anythin' but parkin' violations and petty thefts," he replied acerbically. "I'd like to be there to prove the public wrong."
"And your own instincts, Dex? What about those?" Jackson pressed. "You admitted that you had a hunch that the next kidnapping was going to happen at Crystal River High School this morning."
Dex opened the door and stepped into the hallway. "I was just exaggeratin'. That gold vein petered out a long time ago, Jackson. You coming, Teddi?"
Her gaze darted between the two men. "I'll be along. Go ahead, and I'll catch up in my car later."
"Suit yourself." He shut the door, leaving Teddi in a quandary.
Jackson sighed. "I'm going out to that high school and search for our man before he can kidnap anyone else," he announced resolutely.
"I'd like to go with you, Jackson, but . . ."
"But what? You're afraid to skip the swamp gig, because your hated Ryan will claim all the glory? I think that before you go in either direction, you ought to get your priorities straight, Teddi. I was under the impression that you invited me here to help you find and arrest this vicious animal, not to assist you in winning a game of Red Rover against your ex's team. You've allowed your personal vendetta to cloud your judgment. I don't want you going with me, unless you have absolute faith in me and my visions."
Disappointed by her silence, Jackson snatched his Colt and a few spare clips from his duffel bag, and marched from the suite, leaving Teddi alone to reassess her misplaced principles.
At five-thirty, the bloated clouds released another downpour on the already flooded Sawgrass Expressway west of Fort Lauderdale. The highway was closed to traffic, so Wilkerson ordered an armada of airboats. The watercraft, as well as three FBI helicopters, several Suburbans crowded with agents, and a host of Broward County SWAT vans awaited their orders. Sheriff's deputies lined the high-and-dry shoulder running along the northbound side of the road.
A tent was hastily erected, and now Wilkerson, Sheriff Stark, Dex, and the airboat and helicopter pilots stood on the soft ground, huddled over a enlarged Everglades map. After a short briefing, they nodded their understanding of the rendezvous point, and parted.
The gunmetal eddies on the eastern horizon lightened as the helicopter blades spun to life. The throaty growls of the airboat engines sputtered and caught, their guttural racket hindering communications between the agents and deputies.
"Where's Teddi?" Wilkerson shouted in Dex's ear, as they boarded one of the airboats.
"Dunno."
"Is she coming?"
"I haven't heard."
"Teddi knows about this operation, right?"
Dex nodded.
"Strange," he muttered suspiciously. He tightened the rain slicker hood against the outline of his face. He turned to speak with Dex, but the police chief wasn't there. "Must've switched to one of the other airboats," he said to himself.
The helicopters rose in unison and cut through the downpour toward the bleak Everglades landscape. The airboat pilots heaved their anchors inside and sped across the highway's swift currents.
Wilkerson and his people were so intent on their mission logistics that they failed to notice a smaller airboat beached down the road. Its sole occupant was closely monitoring the activities.
Satisfied, Bo Swinson leaped onto the muddy highway shoulder and strode swiftly toward a black pickup parked behind a thicket of cabbage palms.
The rain let up as Jackson got out of the limousine and hiked the two blocks to the Crystal River High School campus. The expansive school layout included eight separate beige stucco buildings. Jackson whistled. It was a big place to cover, but he decided to start where the vision had dropped him --- with a view of both the student parking lot and the football stadium.
The murky dawn cast very little light on the small throng of students milling about the courtyard and bus ramp. Jackson wore blue jeans, an inexpensive white tee shirt, a light blue windbreaker, and white sneakers so that he would blend into the school setting. The students barely noticed him as he roamed the sprawling campus in search of his psychic vantage point; he figured that they considered him just another substitute teacher. That was the plan.
Four more yellow school buses squeaked to stops, and a steady stream of loquacious students stepped onto the bus ramp and headed in different directions. Many had iPod earphone cords dangling from their ears, while others spoke animatedly into their cell phones. Jackson was especially interested in the heavy girls; they would've attracted Swinson's attention. One probably already had. Swinson's success wasn't due to luck; he obviously scouted his victims well in advance. Therefore, Jackson calculated, the target's daily routine made her an easy victim.
Finally, he reached his objective. He had an unobstructed view of both the parking lot and the stadium. A grounds crewmember was mowing the football field, and several students began painting the gridiron lines in the mower's wake. Jackson snapped his fingers. Dex's hunch was on the money! This was the morning Swinson planned his next kidnapping.
He earnestly scanned the oaks beyond the nearly empty parking lot and watched cigarette smoke mix with the thin mist. Was the target out there? The students were hidden from view, so unless he walked out there and checked them out, he would never know before it was too late.
But that would take him too far from the majority of students, and that was risky. His best chance to stop Swinson would be from his current position. The vision ensured that.
Jackson also knew that Swinson would strike before all of the high school's 3,200 students arrived. That left about a twenty-minute window. He anxiously patted the lump beneath his windbreaker; his Colt was ready for action. Now where was Swinson?
The muggy air was stifling; sweat seeped into his cotton tee shirt and varnished his face, but he ignored the distraction. It was of no consequence. He had a kid to save.
He checked his watch. Fourteen minutes left in that window. Where would the perp strike? He kept scanning the area. But there was nothing out of the ordinary. Just kids being kids. No sign of Swinson or his pickup. Wilkerson had either scared off Swinson with his small invading army, or maybe Dex was wrong about the date of the high school kidnapping after all.
Ten minutes. A chink developed in his customary coolness. He told Teddi to have faith, and now he was suddenly losing his. Could his vision have been off the mark? Was Swinson kidnapping another woman somewhere else? And, why wasn't he receiving his usual vibes from the predicted crime scene? It felt as though someone was blocking them, but who? Another psychic?
Eight minutes. He forced the burgeoning trepidation from his mind and replayed the brief high school vision. He admitted that he hadn't actually witnessed Swinson kidnapping a student. Hadn't exactly seen the undercover cops around, either. Actually, the whole experience was annoyingly vague. But he had definitely sensed an evil presence at the school, and he knew Swinson radiated that malignant energy. Jackson had just put two and two together back at the motel, and . . . here he was.
So where the hell was Swinson?
Five minutes left in the window.
Jackson surveyed the front of the school for suspicious activities or the large man, who would stick out like a sore thumb among the throng of students and teachers. Jackson tried to detect a panicked scream from the playful ones. No dice there, either. His senses strained to detect Swinson's presence.
Nothing.
Three minutes.
The student parking lot was three-quarters full, and the yellow buses lined the curving ramp, awaiting their turn in the unloading zone. The noise levels rose dramatically with each emptied bus. There were shouts, some friendly and some belligerent, and the clamor made it nearly impossible to hear a kidnapped student's cries for help.
Jackson kept pivoting and eyeing the boisterous scene. He felt helpless out there alone. He needed Teddy and Dex, and the Broward County SWAT team would've been welcome, too. But he was used to solitude. Most law enforcement officials were skeptical of his psychic gifts and refused to cooperate with him. Believe him. Even after his paranormal leads resulted in arrests, they wanted nothing to do with him.
They were simply afraid of what they couldn't understand. Couldn't see for themselves. It was all hocus-pocus. A cheap trick. Hell, there were times when his psychic abilities even frightened him, and he needed a few cocktails to soothe the emotional ruffles.
But Teddi and Dex weren't intimated at all. They seemed to understand him, but even their beliefs had limits; otherwise, they'd be here with him right now.
He pictured Teddi in the suite, struggling to decide who to believe. Dex or him. He knew it was tough; she'd just met him. But he had expected her to say something before he left. Make some crack or spout some pennywise philosophy. After all, she always was so outspoken.
He managed a tense grin as he continuously scanned the area. Her insinuation back in the bayou that he was a bachelor by choice was far off the mark. His previous relationships with eligible women had always ended abruptly once they discovered his unusual talents. Finally, he waved the white flag and decided to dedicate his abilities to the FBI. At least they believed.
Two lousy minutes left.
Where the hell was the guy?
He was about to call it a day when a small yelp snagged his attention. He heard it again and swiftly pinpointed its direction. It was coming from the west side of the stadium! He broke into a run and easily spied the large man holding a kicking, thrashing woman under his arm. Butterflies fluttered in Jackson's stomach. The victim was a woman, not a high school girl!
When he reached the edge of the stadium shadows, he drew his gun and froze. Oh no! God, no!
The thrashing woman was Teddi!
"Hold it, Swinson!" Jackson shouted. "Let her go!"
The big man's bearded face twisted with rage. "Back off, Psycho Man, or I'll break the little lady's neck!"
Suddenly, Teddi went limp in his arm and ceased struggling.
"What have you done to her?" Jackson demanded. He leveled his Colt at the bridge of Swinson's nose.
"None of your fucking business!" he spat. "Back off."
"Let her go, and I'll let you escape scot-free."
Bo Swinson guffawed at Jackson's proposition. "Do I look like I was born yesterday, asshole?"
"I'm not kidding." Jackson released his Colt, and it bounced once on the grass. "There, see? I'm completely on the level. Now I've kept my end of the bargain. Let her go."
"I never made no bargain, butthead."
Jackson felt students congregating behind him. He turned his head. "Get back, all of you. I don't want anybody getting shot!" he yelled at them. Several teachers and administrators herded the students back to safety.
"You've got too many witnesses this time, Swinson, to get away with this. And, we know where you live," Jackson shouted.
Bo considered that for a brief second. "It don't make any difference now," he claimed. "I've got ways to disappear."
"And what about your victims --- sacrifices? If you abandon them, what will happen to you? You can't quit, can you?"
Swinson paled. "You don't know shit, Psycho Man. I can quit whenever I feel like it."
Jackson stepped forward. "Then quit now and let her go." When he saw that Swinson wasn't going to budge, Jackson added, "What'll happen if you stop kidnapping these women?"
"Mind your own fuckin' business!"
"Will those orange eyes appear?" Jackson tested him.
Swinson was stunned. "Shut up. You don't know nothin'."
Swinson lowered Teddi's limp form and wrapped his monstrous hands around her neck. "Now kick the gun over here, or this little chickadee won't sing no more."
Jackson didn't have a choice. He did as Swinson directed.
"Good boy. Now back off!" Swinson dragged Teddi to the driver's side of his pickup and vigilantly opened the door. He looked back at Jackson. "I said back off! Last warning."
Jackson deliberately peddled backward until he reached the asphalt of the bus ramp, but he maintained eye contact with Swinson.
The big man turned away and shoved Teddi across the bench seat. As the kidnapper pointed his gun at Jackson, a single shot rang out --- but not from Swinson's gun. The big man stumbled, leaned heavily against the open truck door, and gawked at the red stain spreading on his plaid shirt. He shot Jackson a questioning glance before collapsing to his knees with a muddy splash.
There was chaos behind Jackson as the students began screaming wildly and scrambling into the courtyard. Sirens whined in the distance. Jackson searched the school grounds for the shooter and recognized Dex crossing the lawn between the student parking lot and the stadium.
Jackson and Dex reached Swinson simultaneously as he tumbled face first into the mud. Jackson rolled him, and Dex kept his gun trained on the kidnapper. Swinson's muddied eyes blinked open like an awakening corpse. Bubbling blood leaked from the corners of his mouth as Jackson felt for a pulse. Weak and growing weaker. The chest wound bled like a breached dam; the bullet must have hit his heart.
With considerable effort, Swinson's hand closed on the necklace around his neck and yanked it off. A bamboo, flute-like whistle dangled from the tarnished chain. He stuffed it into Jackson's open palm.
Blood spurted between his brown teeth when he flashed Jackson a terrifying grin. "The responsibility's all . . . yours now, Psycho . . . Man." Blood gurgled in his throat as he attempted a laugh. "You won't last . . . long." His hand flopped to the ground. Broward County's kidnapping horrors were over.
Jackson glanced up at Dex. "Thought you weren't coming," he said mordantly.
Dex pumped his shoulders. "Guess I found those instincts you were jawin' about back at the motel. I reckon they weren't as lost as I thought they were, after all."
Jackson thanked him with a fleeting grin, then sobered and gestured toward the open pickup door.
Dex nodded. "Let's get our Teddi to the hospital, pronto."
Jackson absently studied the odd necklace, shoved it into his pocket, and helped Dex tug Teddi's flaccid body from the truck.
When Dex hurried away to get his Impala, Jackson pulled out the flute-whistle again. The bloodied object was inscribed with strange symbols. What responsibility was the murderous bastard referring to? Jackson shook his head. He'd never know. Swinson was dead, and the secret had died with him.
Suddenly, an unforeseen tremor raked Jackson's spine and head. Those terrifying orange eyes appeared in his mind, followed by a whispered warning. Quit this assignment and go back home to the bayou. If you don't, you will all die horrible deaths.
He swooned, but quickly steadied himself against the side of the truck. Where had that message come from? And who was responsible for it?
After his head cleared, Jackson looked at Teddi. She was still unconscious. He considered quitting for a second, and dismissed it. He was determined to locate the other psychic who had earlier blocked Swinson's evil aura and delivered the warning.
But it was going to be the most elaborate mystery he had ever tackled.
As the airboats roared toward Demon Key, a dense silver veil shrouded the water and looming trees on the small island. The pilot pointed out the cypress, bay, and willow silhouettes peppering the key to Wilkerson, who was the closest passenger to him and the only one within the sound of his shouted spiel.
"I heard this used to be a beautiful spot before them damned Swinsons settled here," the pilot explained. "Rookeries and orchids abounded, but the Swinsons drove off the birds and killed the flowers."
Wilkerson wasn't in the mood for a guided tour. He wanted Swinson. "How much farther?" he asked curtly.
"On the other side of them trees, we'll find the main house. Beyond that, I just don't know. I ain't been out here for thirty years, and even then I got run off by a couple shotgun blasts," the pilot replied.
Dawn lightened the black sky to sooty thunderheads, and the rain continued; Wilkerson was drenched to the bone despite his rain slicker. Where the rain didn't soak him, his perspiration did from the oppressive air.
The boats slowed, and Wilkerson watched a wide dock emerge from the mist.
"The boats'll put in on either side of it," the pilot announced. The old man motioned for the pilots to head toward the dock.
Wilkerson kept a wary eye out for their quarry, who would no doubt be armed. The boats slid to a halt on the reedy shoreline, and the pilots cut their engines. The sudden silence was staggering.
Wilkerson spoke into his radiophone. "Let's go for it, but keep a sharp eye out for the perp. Remember, he's armed and dangerous."
Splashes and surly grunts punctuated the first wave of agents and deputies to disembark. Dozens of snakes swam in serpentine motions across the wind-agitated surface toward the waders, but they were met by fiery blasts from two flamethrowers. Flames whooshed across the murky water and into the thick reeds and turned back the aggressive serpents.
The old airboat captain ducked beneath the blade housing. "Hoppin' hellcats, what you boys tryin' to do, burn down the damned key?" he shouted angrily.
Wilkerson patted his shoulder. "Self-defense, old-timer. I heard about all the water moccasins out here, and I wasn't taking any chances with the safety of my men."
"Should've worn snake boots," he grumbled.
Wilkerson jumped onto the rickety dock and led the way up a broken stone path that sliced through the stand of interlaced trees and the impenetrable, vine-choked underbrush. Several agents tripped on cypress knees protruding from the ground that were obscured by the unusually high water and the low ground mist. Groans, splashes, and curses filled the air.
The deputies, agents, and SWAT team members all wore protective Kevlar-lined camouflage vests. Just in case. Wilkerson was extremely skilled at mission preparations and rarely missed a detail.
Until today.
The SWAT snipers encircled the single-story, rot-blistered house two hundred feet west of the dock. The mist swam beneath the house and around the stilts like a living entity, as rainwater cascaded from the tin eaves like a silvery cataract. The windows were all shuttered, and there was no sign of life.
Wilkerson slipped his phone headset beneath his hood and clipped them into place over the top of his head. He called the pilot in charge of the three helicopters that were orbiting the key.
"What have we got here?" Wilkerson demanded.
"A house --- more like a shack. No connections to outbuildings, but there is a huge pole barn due west about another fifty yards," the pilot replied.
"That it?"
"No, I see a small cemetery on a hill another hundred feet beyond the pole barn. There's a brick mausoleum at the top of the hill, and what appears to be grave markers all around it. I can't tell if anyone's out there. The fog's too damn thick."
"Can you drop lower?"
"Sorry, sir. We might hit a tree. That's all I've got for you except that . . . there's . . . nothing but swamp as far as the eye can see."
"Goddammit, run an infrared thermal scan on the house, then do the same with the pole barn! Find me that perp! I want to know where he is yesterday!" Wilkerson shouted.
"Yes, sir," the lead pilot responded nervously.
Two blue herons and a flock of egrets took flight from Wilkerson's shouting. Sheriff Stark and the SWAT leader, Jeriff, frowned at his reckless outburst, but Wilkerson was too caught up in the moment to give a shit how those two rated his field actions.
Minutes slowly passed as the small force awaited further orders. Finally, Wilkerson's radio crackled, and he answered it immediately.
"Where's our perp?" he demanded from the helicopter pilot.
"Uh, I'm afraid we didn't get a warm-body reading in either location, except for small animals."
"Well, this guy isn't a goddamned small animal!"
"Yes, sir."
"Scan the whole damn island and get back to me."
Wilkerson turned to Stark and Jeriff. "We're going in," he told them brusquely. "Jeriff, have your snipers ready for immediate back-up."
The muscular young man with an unshaven face replied with a sharp nod.
Wilkerson and a dozen agents broke from their cover behind several waving scrub palms and proceeded cautiously through the open area and up the stairs to the front entrance of the house. Before Wilkerson could direct one of his men to kick the door in, Agent Jensen twisted the doorknob. The door swung in on creaking hinges, and Wilkerson shot the agent a you're-out-of-line scowl, but didn't reprimand him.
Jensen shoved the door open wider until the knob collided with the wall behind it, allowing the gray daylight to diffuse the darkness beyond the threshold. The opening leaked a fetid malodor that instantly sickened the men. They fell back, pinching their nostrils and gasping untainted air.
Unfazed, Wilkerson remained in the doorway, listening.
Silence. Not even the burbling of an aquarium or the ticking of a clock. Nothing. Dread knotted the agents' stomachs. Most had never been involved in the arrest of a serial killer-kidnapper, and they were apprehensive about what horrors they might encounter inside. Decayed and mangled body parts were foremost in each agent's mind, except for Wilkerson. He'd been involved in seven such arrests, and his sensibilities were calloused against such atrocities.
Wilkerson stepped into the gloom and gestured to the others, and they briskly entered and scattered to secure their flanks. With their guns drawn and battle-ready, the men donned their night-vision goggles and advanced deeper into the menacing house.
An ambulance rushed Teddi to Holy Cross Hospital near Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, where she was quickly admitted without the typical red tape. Dex and Jackson insisted she be placed in a private room, and a phone call from Charlie Simmons in Washington to the hospital's CEO heavily reinforced that request.
Within ten minutes of her room assignment, three stoic FBI agents were stationed outside her door. An FBI medical team familiar with the dart poison was quickly flown in from Miami by helicopter, and they immediately seized control of her medical care from the local emergency room doctor and staff.
Once the doctors had tested and treated Teddi and left, Dex slouched uncomfortably in one of the plastic chairs in her room and examined the radiophone Wilkerson had given him before they boarded the airboat. It was standard issue --- nothing to get excited about.
Jackson stood beside the window and stared pensively into the dreary weather. Teddi was in a coma, but her eyes were frozen wide open and were hauntingly lucid.
The FBI doctor, Les George, was a short, wiry man with a full black beard and intelligent gray eyes. He had painstakingly conducted a few rudimentary tests on Teddi earlier and had determined that her senses of sight and hearing were fully functional.
Dr. George had pulled the two men aside. "In other words," he whispered, "be careful what you say and do around Teddi. She will remember any comments or actions that you make."
Dex grunted and sat back in the hard chair, while Jackson leaned over the bed rail and gently held her hand.
"Thank you, Teddi." He smiled down at her. "I'm pleased that you had enough faith in me to come to the high school, but I'm sorry that things turned out this way for you." He bent down until his lips brushed her ear. "I'm leaving shortly. There's some unfinished business I have to take care of. You won't see me around here again. When you recover, look me up. You know where I live." He kissed her cheek.
Jackson turned to Dex. "What made you come back to the school?"
Dex cleared his throat. "I guess I figured that old Bo would be too bright to get caught with his pants down on that skinny little key of his 'cause he's one smart cookie. He was more than likely up to no good in town, so the high school was as good a place as any to start lookin' for him."
"I appreciate your trust. Thanks."
Dex's face was stone. "For what? I was just following a legitimate lead, that's all. Strictly business, you understand."
"Then I admire your tenacity."
Dr. George stepped into the room. "I hate to interrupt this love fest, but you two have been here long enough. I can't be tripping over you two every time I move around. Why don't you grab a bite to eat downstairs in the hospital commons, and then hang around the first-floor lobby afterward? I'll send word down to you as soon as Teddi perks up."
"The guards stay," Jackson stressed.
"Of course. No problem."
"How long till our girl comes to?" Dex asked.
The doctor turned to Dex and shrugged. "Depends on how large a dose she received. If her kidnapper calibrated the dosage for her size, then maybe it'll wear off in a few hours. If he injected her with the same measure of poison that he administered to his three hundred pound victims, Teddi may not snap out of it till early evening."
Dex pivoted. "Well, Jackson, what do you say?" But Jackson wasn't there --- or anywhere inside the room.
"Where'd he go?" Dex asked the doctor.
Dr. George looked perplexed. "I didn't see him leave."
Dex ran to the door and poked his head into the hallway. Jackson wasn't in sight in either direction. He sure as hell moved fast!
He closed the door, grabbed his raincoat beside his chair, and then froze. The FBI radiophone was gone. Now why in the world would Jackson need that radio?
Suddenly, Dex knew.
Jackson returned to the motel suite, gathered his things, and paid the bill at the front desk. He phoned the private hangar and arranged for his charter plane to fly him back to Louisiana at ten that night. Then he contacted Charlie Simmons and requested that an FBI helicopter drop him on Demon Key as soon as possible. He would be at the staging area alongside the flooded Sawgrass Expressway in thirty minutes. Charlie promised to have a chopper waiting for him.
As the limo cruised through the flooded surface streets, Jackson leaned back and closed his eyes. There were way too many questions that needed answering. If Bo Swinson knew about the FBI raid on his key, and Jackson was certain that he had, then why didn't he run? Instead, he carried out his plan to kidnap a female student from Crystal River High School. When he saw Teddi on the school grounds, again instead of retreating to safety, he attempted to kidnap her, despite Jackson standing fifty yards away with an unobstructed view of the crime. Didn't Swinson know his odds of getting out of there were slim?
Nothing seemed right about this case. On the surface, it appeared as if Swinson wanted to be caught --- or worse, killed in the attempted abduction. Was he suicidal? Stupid? Dex didn't think so, and Jackson trusted Dex's instincts. Then what was it? The answer had to be on Demon Key.
He stuck his hand into his pocket and withdrew the necklace Swinson had given him. He inspected the small bamboo flute-whistle, turning it over and over while trying to decipher the strange figures painted on the ancient wood instrument. Jackson was familiar with Egyptian hieroglyphics and other cuneiform symbols, but these were completely unknown to him. Stumped, he slid the necklace back in his jeans pocket.
He looked out the rain-splattered limo window and watched the FBI helicopter descend to the ground beside the green tent Wilkerson had erected on a flat highway embankment. Empty Suburbans, SWAT vans, deputy sheriff cruisers, and powerful pickups with attached airboat trailers were crammed into a confined area of flattened grass and mud furrows.
Jackson sighed and shut his eyes again. He hated flying in helicopters, much less being strapped in a harness and lowered to the ground from one. Choppers were too unstable; they were dangerously susceptible to fluctuations in wind direction and velocity. But he didn't have a choice.
Suddenly, large, terrifying orange eyes sprang open in the dark recesses of his memory and jolted him from his reverie. He fervently hoped that he didn't run into the creature with those savage eyes on Demon Key.
He dashed from the limousine to the helicopter, his clothes fluttering violently from the rushing air beneath the whirling blades. As he jumped inside and pulled the door closed, the hair prickled on the base of his neck. The trip was a return of sorts to his Demon Key psychic vision, and he was frightened of what he might find there.
Death and monsters.
This time for real.
By the time Jackson unbuckled the harness and watched it climb back toward the winch inside the helicopter, Wilkerson was standing beside him in shin-deep water, his gaze boring into Jackson's.
"Who invited you to the party?"
"Charlie Simmons. Know him?"
"Don't be a wiseass, LaFevre."
Jackson gestured toward the house. "Find anything in there?"
"You mean like Swinson?"
"No, Swinson's dead."
Wilkerson laughed humorlessly. "Yeah, right."
Jackson briefly relayed the events at Crystal River High School.
The agent's face blanched, and the sudden absence of wind left his egotistical sails drooping. "Dex shot him?" He looked at his feet, incredulous. "I wondered where the son-of-a-bitch had disappeared to."
"Well, now you know. I'm going to have a look inside the house, if you don't mind."
"Would it make a difference if I did?"
Jackson grinned. "Not really."
"There's a rotten stench inside there. I'd have second thoughts about searching the place, if I were you."
"Have you located the source of the smell?"
Wilkerson stiffened. What was LaFevre driving at? That he didn't know how to conduct a search, for chrissakes? The pompous bastard! "No, and we went through everything with a fine-tooth comb, but you're welcome to check it out for yourself. You might try the basement first," he said with disdain.
Jackson turned away and approached the closest SWAT team member. "Mind if I use the gasmask clipped to your belt?"
"Nah, go ahead. I guess I won't be needing it," he grumbled, frustrated at the lack of action. He helped Jackson adjust the head straps until it fit snugly to his face.
Jackson sloshed through the water, keeping an eye out for snakes, especially the poisonous variety. He climbed the steps to the unsteady landing and entered. The FBI had strung ceiling lights throughout the inside, powered by a relatively quiet portable generator under the house. He slipped on a pair of latex gloves and began his search.
The FBI agents had stripped the rotting oak desk in the corner, the tables, and small bookcase of anything pertaining to the case. He moved on. A double bed and a six-drawer dresser completely filled the small bedroom. Next came the narrow kitchen with warped oak cabinet doors, a propane refrigerator, a Formica table, two chairs upholstered with ruptured red Naugahyde, a propane stove with a dented coffee pot perched over one of the burners, and a doublewide sink with an old-fashioned hand pump at one end.
The closets were lightly populated with stained, threadbare clothing, while the pantry held mostly canned foods. Jackson checked the expiration dates on the can labels --- most had expired long ago.
The sofa with badly sagging cushions occupied the center of the living room, along with a now-empty gun rack, a desk, two tables with oil lamps, a listing leather recliner, a mildew-mottled leather ottoman, and a new flat-screen plasma television with rabbit ears taped to a windowsill.
Jackson paused. Everything but the television pointed to an electric-free house. Then where was the generator? He searched the small interior again, including the filthy bathroom with a discolored lion's feet tub. Nothing. He inspected the television and noted that it was plugged into an extension cord, not a normal outlet. The cord protruded from a crudely cut, jagged hole in the wall like an orange tongue sticking out from a mouthful of broken teeth.
Jackson lightly tugged the extension cord, and the resistance came from upstairs. He glanced at the ceiling. He hadn't found an attic entrance, but that had to be where the generator was.
He checked every nook and cranny of the downstairs rooms, but he came up empty. Exasperated, he searched the house from the outside, ignoring Wilkerson's scowls until the solution became obvious. The outer kitchen wall was a little thicker than the other walls in the house. He snapped his fingers and shot Wilkerson a wide grin.
He reentered the house, opened the pantry, and tapped the wall backing the shelves. Hollow! He probed the edges until he located a cleverly hidden spring lever tucked inside a shelf support. He pushed it up, and the wall swung out noiselessly, revealing a dark, narrow staircase. Jackson directed his flashlight into the pitch-black attic and slowly began his ascent.
Halfway up, he stretched an edge of the gasmask away from his face and sniffed. Tears erupted in his eyes and his stomach gurgled. God, what a smell! He quickly secured his mask, but the rank odor had already tainted his nose and mouth, and no matter how many times he swallowed, it stubbornly clung to his senses.
The hairs stiffened on his neck as they had when he boarded the helicopter. He recognized the malodor at once.
It was death's calling card.
With another five steps he reached the attic, and his knees felt rubbery from the uncertain climb. Did Swinson booby-trap the attic, knowing that the rotten smell would attract the investigators' attention immediately? Jackson's common sense implored him to retreat and let Wilkerson step into the trap; it was only fitting.
But his curiosity prevailed. If he was to discover anything pertinent about Swinson, like a motive, this had to be a good starting point.
So despite his misgivings, Jackson brushed the sticky spider webs from his path and took that final step into the attic. Death's flavor dried his mouth and electrified his nerves. He inhaled deeply behind the gasmask, and it shredded the eerie silence like one of Darth Vader's rasping breaths. He raised his left foot and gradually put all his weight on it to test the floor strength. It rigidly supported his weight.
He panned his flashlight beam through the baleful darkness until it fell on a sight so abhorrent that Jackson screamed out!
A naked and decayed corpse lay against the wall. The heavyset woman's lifeless hands dangled stiffly in manacles, and her hollow sockets stared directly at Jackson. The victim easily had weighed three hundred pounds at one time, but large sections of her fatty flesh had been cleaved away. Black pus seeped from the open wounds, white maggots squirmed inside the putrefying cavities, and fat sluggish flies buzzed in the triangular attic space.
Jackson heard cries below and swore. His startled scream had alerted Wilkerson and his team of incompetents to his presence in the attic; he only had seconds to scour the area for clues to Swinson's motives before the valuable evidence was confiscated.
He rushed across the attic and examined the woman's face. Terror contorted her facial muscles, dislocated her right jaw, and created an explosion of gruesome blood vessels webbed across her pallid complexion. She sat slumped on the planks in her own excrement and urine.
Jackson lifted her chin to compare it to the known victims, but lowered it quickly. This woman was not one of them. Then who was she? His lips became a taut line. Another annoying question with no answer.
Footsteps sounded on the attic access stairway. Jackson quickly searched her body for clues. When he looked down her back, he noted that she was seated on what appeared to be a half-cushion. Odd, he thought. Despite her horrible appearance, he directed his light between her sliced back and the wall and leaned closer for a better view.
"Hey, get away from her!" Wilkerson commanded through his gasmask from the stairway.
Jackson ignored the directive and studied a peculiar object near the floor. He winced as he wedged his masked face between her rotting flesh and the wall. He growled. The woman's manacled arm prevented him from getting a better angle.
He could barely make out a thin wire that was looped between the top of the cushion and something beneath it. Was it some kind of tortuous device?
"Get away from the victim before you contaminate the crime scene!" Wilkerson's voice sounded closer.
Suddenly, Jackson had a very good idea what it was, and swiftly but cautiously --- very cautiously --- raised his flashlight hand and his head from the narrow space without jarring the corpse. His pulse quickened, and perspiration dribbled between his shoulder blades.
Wilkerson was standing over him as he looked up. Three agents appeared at the top of the stairs and strode across the attic floor.
Craaackk!
A plank splintered, and one of the agent's legs disappeared into the fractured opening. The corpse swayed, her bloated hands rattling the manacles. A swarm of flies scrambled into the air like jet fighters, carelessly colliding with Jackson and Wilkerson.
Jackson swiftly threw his arms around the woman's stiff shoulders and steadied her.
"For chrissakes, there're too many people up here! Go back down!" Jackson yelled at the three agents through his mask.
"I told you to take your cotton-pickin' hands off the victim!" Wilkerson growled, drawing his weapon. "I'm not asking you again."
"Put your gun away, Wilkerson, and listen!"
The agent hesitated. He didn't like taking orders from a rental psychic. Why did Charlie have to drag LaFevre's sorry ass into this investigation, anyway? It wasn't his investigation.
"So what's your problem?" the agent demanded.
"My problem is that this corpse is sitting on a pressure plate, and if we shift her weight just a little, a bomb goes off," Jackson shot back.
The agent's eyes widened. "You on the level?"
Jackson stood. "Call in your bomb squad. I'm leaving."
Wilkerson blocked his path and motioned toward the corpse. "Who's she?"
Jackson shoved Wilkerson aside and scooped an oversized, green alligator purse from a pile of clothing on the floor beside her. He rummaged through the hodge-podge inside until he located her wallet. He flipped through the plastic windows.
"Amanda Lutz from St. Louis. Age thirty-eight."
"God, we didn't even know about her."
"Probably a tourist, and nobody's missed her yet," Jackson hypothesized, and handed both items to the agent.
"Jesus, what the hell did Swinson do to her?"
"Looks like he cannibalized her," he replied dolefully.
Wilkerson turned toward the staircase. "Hey, Jensen, get the bomb squad out here, and order everyone back at least a hundred feet from the house."
"Yes, sir." Jensen's head disappeared.
"What do you make of this?" Jackson asked.
"I don't know yet. Not enough facts."
"Really?"
Wilkerson sneered at the psychic. "You got some kind of theory?"
"Not a theory --- a fact."
"You gonna lay it on me, or am I going to have to wait until your book's published?"
"You're really an asshole, you know that, Wilkerson?" Jackson headed for the stairs.
"You can't tell me 'cause you ain't got shit, LaFevre!"
Jackson pivoted. "That corpse has nothing to do with the other missing women. She's purely a setup --- for us. To throw us off the scent."
"What scent?"
"The scent leading us to the truth --- what he really used his other victims for."
Wilkerson considered that for a moment. "Maybe he just wanted to murder us --- you and me."
"He couldn't be certain that we'd be up here when the bomb detonated. No, he's playing with us from the grave."
"What do you suppose Swinson was hiding out here?"
The fierce orange eyes opened up and glowed in Jackson's memory. He shivered. "I don't know, but we might find something that'll give us an idea when we search the rest of the key."
"Yeah, I suppose."
"And Wilkerson?"
"Yeah."
"Don't let anybody near any of the other buildings until they've been cleared by the bomb squad."
The agent didn't argue the point.
Jackson and Special Agent Wilkerson climbed down the stairs toward the dingy light outside. Both were privately asking, what next?
Three uneasy hours passed before the FBI bomb squad disarmed the attic bomb, and their bomb-sniffing canines located two more of Swinson's lethal booby traps. Thankfully, there were no more victims unearthed.
Jackson wandered impatiently on the high stone path between the pole barn and cemetery, while the bomb squad expertly executed their duties; he was barely able to mask his reservations about exploring the mausoleum that loomed from the mist like an evil beacon. He remained as poker-faced as he could around Wilkerson so he wouldn't tip his hand about the mausoleum's possible secrets. He was certain that he'd discover what happened to the kidnapped victims, thereby establishing Swinson's motives. But his speculation was based solely on the horrors displayed in his brief psychic vision, and he seriously doubted whether Wilkerson would buy it.
Jackson exhaled deeply. He'd just have to play it by ear.
A severe squall kicked up, and the blowing rain drenched the entire search party. Jackson turned his back against the driving downpour and cursed the weather, as he waited for the overly vigilant Wilkerson to lead his team into the pole barn. When the group finally disappeared into the imposing blue steel-and-glass structure, Jackson swiftly scaled the misty hill that separated the quick and the dead sections of the key to the brick burial chamber. Half-sunken grave markers dotted the hillside, and he wondered how many of those buried there had died in the jaws of Ike Noonan's monster.
The bomb squad had unlocked the mausoleum door during their earlier bomb search, so Jackson merely raised the rusted latch and pushed the door inward. The air was stale and dank, but was a far cry from the disgusting attic odors.
There was a singular smell that didn't belong in a human burial crypt --- the heavy musk of an animal. He tugged on the dangling light chain, and the bright incandescent bulb chased the shadows. Two brick-and-mortared tombs, one above the other, were sealed into each of the five walls of the pentagon structure. A three-foot, polished rock pedestal rested in the center of the lone room and supported a gold sarcophagus. Ancient paintings of vile witches, smirking demons, and deformed trolls decorated the pedestal's surface. Jackson ran his hand along the smooth rock surface and marveled at the old world craftsmanship, but again he was puzzled by the source of such handiwork.
He dropped his gaze to the limestone floor and studied several purplish-black stains. Blood. Layers and layers of dried blood. Decades of bloodletting absorbed into the porous stone. Perhaps longer.
And most of the blotches encircled the pedestal.
Jackson checked the bottom of the sarcophagus for a camouflaged lever that would unlock the golden tomb, but it refused to give up its secret. Next, he circled the rock on his hands and knees and scrutinized the seam where the pedestal met the floor. He didn't detect any telltale air drafts or any means of moving the unwieldy pedestal.
He lowered his nose to the seam and sniffed.
A faint musk scent. Nothing more. Was the animal scent emanating from the limestone floor or rising from somewhere below it? One thing was obvious --- he couldn't move the pedestal without help, and he didn't trust Wilkerson or his men. The foolish glory hound would likely rush down into the unknown depths and be slaughtered.
If there was something beneath the floor.
With bulbous orange eyes.
Jackson tucked a shoulder under the broad edge of the sarcophagus and lifted.
"Shit!" he swore, as the edge cut into his shoulder. The damned thing wouldn't budge, probably because it was somehow attached to the pedestal.
He had a sudden inspiration and pulled the flute-whistle from his pocket; he poked it between his lips and blew, but only a rush of hissing air escaped the opposite end. He examined the bizarre instrument and observed a small hole in each of the two tubes. One was twice as close to the player's lips than the other.
Covering the hole on the right, he tried again. A soft, shrill note pierced the silence. He released his finger from the first hole and covered the second hole. A pleasant mid-range note.
Jackson listened for a reaction, but nothing stirred. He smothered both holes, puffed his cheeks, and blew gently into the instrument. A discordant bass note penetrated and distressed his middle ear. The mausoleum spun, and he collapsed against the sarcophagus, breathing hard and fighting back waves of nausea. His skin grew clammy, slick, and ashen, and a hot flash swept through him like a hot spring.
Bad vibrations! A fleeting smile curled the corners of his mouth. If only The Beach Boys could have heard that note, they might have written an entirely different version of their hit song, "Good Vibrations."
His body eventually cooled, and his light-headedness dissipated. He inspected the brightly painted figures on the underside of the instrument. A coiled snake. A snake with a human head in its mouth. A snake with an arrow through its head. The depiction of each triangular viper head was greatly exaggerated. He bit his lip as he attempted to make sense of them.
He rotated the flute-whistle and saw an even bigger snake biting down upon an entire Indian village of crudely sketched teepees. He absently tapped the instrument with his forefinger. What did the symbols mean?
His mind frantically processed the information, but after a few minutes, it came up empty. Another enigma to be solved.
He blew the high note, then the mid-note, followed by the bass note. His head spun again, but the effects weren't as intense this time. He listened for a reaction again, but nothing happened.
Maybe he was way off base. The instrument was most likely a souvenir Swinson had picked up at one of the tourist-trap islands during a Caribbean cruise.
Fat chance!
He reversed the set, and again there was no discernable response. He blew mid-note, high, and bass.
All hell broke loose!
Savage roars shattered the wind-tossed key silence, and a flock of ravens cawed boisterously above the mausoleum as they rowed through the mist toward Gator Creek. Jackson dropped to his knees and listened at the seam along the pedestal base, but he heard nothing there. He jumped up and sprinted outside. Ghostly roaring and furious splashing reverberated across the Everglades, causing three frightened blue herons to take wing.
"What the hell are you up to now, LaFevre, scaring the wildlife away like that?" Wilkerson yelled from the hill fronting the pole barn.
"What do you have against alligators, anyway?" Sheriff Stark added.
Jackson stuffed the baffling instrument back into his pocket and played innocent. "So that's what made those roars. They nearly scared me to death."
"Yeah. They usually roar like that during mating season, but that's done." He regarded Jackson suspiciously. "Something spooked them."
Jackson shrugged. "I didn't see or hear anything."
"Maybe it's just your personality," Wilkerson said as he approached Jackson. "Rubs them the wrong way."
Jackson restrained his irritation with the man. "Maybe it was something I said," he cracked, joining the ribbing in self-defense. He abandoned the hill and joined the others in the shallow valley between the hills.
Stark guffawed. "I think you hit the nail on the head, Jackson."
"Find anything in the barn?" he asked Wilkerson.
"An operating room setup with all the latest equipment and instruments. Pretty sick, if you ask me." The agent paused. "You find anything in the crypt?"
"I didn't hit the jackpot, if that's what you mean. I did find a gold sarcophagus."
Stark appeared surprised. "No shit? I never heard about that being there."
"You guys can check it out for yourselves. I'm hitting the road."
Stark offered his hand. "See you later?"
"Probably not --- my job's finished here."
"Give my best to Teddi."
"Me, too," Wilkerson added reluctantly.
Jackson rushed along the path so he could catch the first airboat back to the staging area.
"I need to talk to you, Jackson. Something's wrong."
He stopped dead and looked all around him. "Who said that?"
"I did."
No one was in sight. "Who's 'I'?"
"It's me. Teddi. Don't you recognize my voice?"
"I'm having trouble locating that voice of yours at the moment."
"It's inside your head."
He frowned. "C'mon, cut the crap. Where are you?"
"In my hospital room."
He smiled. "This is some kind of joke, right?"
"If you were lying in a coma on this rock of a bed, you'd see just how big a fucking joke it was," she snapped angrily.
"All right, sorry. I'm on my way to see you now."
"I thought you weren't coming back."
"You changed my mind."
"Who you talking to?" Agent Adams stepped out from behind a tree, a malicious grin creasing his face.
"Myself. I never get bored that way," Jackson retorted.
Adams and several others behind him chuckled.
"When's the first airboat off this hellhole?" he asked Adams.
The agent pointed in the direction of the dock. "There's one leaving in a few minutes to take the bomb squad back to the mainland."
"Thanks."
Jackson reached the boat and leaped aboard just as it started backing away from the shore. As he sat down on the aluminum bench, the flute-whistle dug into his hip. He adjusted its position in his pocket and seriously considered tossing the damned thing overboard, but Swinson's last words stopped him.
The responsibility's all yours now, Psycho Man.
Why had Swinson wasted his dying breath relating that? What responsibility was he referring to, and what did it have to do with the strange instrument?
He recalled the chaos outside the mausoleum the last time he played the flute-whistle. Were those eerie notes to blame, and if so, what power did the curious thing possess?
And now to Teddi. When did she develop mental telepathy? And how? And to top that off, why was her mind linked to his?
Jackson massaged his pounding temples.
Stopping Swinson had opened a whole new can of worms, and Jackson didn't like it one damn bit.
Dex had just turned the page of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel sports section and was perusing the baseball scores when an FBI agent approached him in the Holy Cross Hospital lobby. He looked up and glanced around the friendly confines. It was safer here these days.
During his three brief trips to his office, he had to push through a noisy horde of aggressive reporters looking to interview the man who shot and killed Bo Swinson. Questions flew at him like machine gun bullets, but he passed the buck to good ole Special Agent Ryan Wilkerson. He even spelled the agent's name for them. Despite the annoying situation, siccing those bastards on that crumb Wilkerson felt damned good. Clear down to the bone.
The agent cleared his throat. "Dr. George would like to see you upstairs outside Special Agent McCoy's room."
When the two stepped out of the elevator on the fourth floor, Dex was surprised to see Jackson speaking with Dr. George.
"Didn't think I'd see you around these parts again," Dex said, extending his hand.
"Neither did I, but something came up," he replied evasively, shaking Dex's hand.
"Now, gentlemen, I'm afraid I have some bad news," Dr. George stated.
Both men frowned. What now?
"We ran some blood work to isolate the toxin in Teddi's system, and I'm afraid it's not the same chemical that your dead perp used on that black boy in Pompano Beach." He slipped on a pair of wire-rim reading glasses and scanned the brief list of identified substances in Teddi's toxic analysis report. "There's one substance present in the poison that is totally unknown to us. We're checking the worldwide databases, but that will take time. However, there are chemicals that we do recognize. One of them is a hallucinogen, and the other a powerful narcotic found in Mickey Finns."
"The knock-out stuff you add to a cocktail?" Jackson said.
"Precisely."
Jackson shuffled his feet nervously. "What ingredient could cause a major side effect like . . ."
"A coma?"
"Right," he agreed, although he was fishing for another response.
"No. In the lab's expert opinion, the unknown component is responsible for Teddi's condition."
"If you don't know what the toxin is, then how can you treat it?" Dex asked.
Dr. George released a prolonged sigh. "We can't really. If I prescribe a drug that negatively reacts with an unknown substance, Teddi could possibly die," he answered grimly.
"So we're up Shit Creek without a paddle," Jackson summarized.
"I'm afraid so, although I wouldn't have put it quite that way," Dr. George agreed, his sense of propriety assaulted by the crude remark.
"Any other possible side effects?" Jackson persisted. Like mental telepathy?
"There're too many unknowns here for me to speculate."
Dex stepped in front of the doctor. "Teddi is going to wake up, right, Doc?"
Suddenly Jackson gasped. A pallid, ethereal apparition sat on the wall beside them, listening. It was Teddi, or at least it appeared to be her!
The other two followed Jackson's stunned gaze, but saw nothing.
"Get back in your room!" Jackson hissed through clenched teeth.
"Why? So you guys can talk behind my back?" she retorted, but she "popped" out of sight like Samantha from the classic television show, Bewitched.
Jackson turned his head and smiled sheepishly at his companions. "Sorry, I thought I saw someone."
"Teddi?" Dex asked, his eyes incredulous.
"On the wall?" Dr. George exclaimed.
Jackson chuckled. "No, no, of course not." He rubbed his eyes. "I think I just need some sleep. It's been a long time between winks."
The doctor rolled his eyes and immediately dismissed the incident as pitiful lunacy. "So . . . can you handle your shift for watching over Teddi? I really need some shut-eye myself." Without waiting for an answer, he wheeled around and walked swiftly down the corridor to the nurses' station, his heels clicking sharply on the white tile floor.
Dex tugged at Jackson's arm. "We need to talk."
"That's not exactly what I had in mind."
"Now!" The police chief hesitated. "I saw her, too."
"Mind telling me what's going on?" Dex insisted, after they purchased coffees and sat at an isolated table in the vast hospital commons. "And don't try bull shittin' me. I'm not as easy to bamboozle as the doctor."
"I know that."
He squinted at Jackson. "Well?"
"You're not going to believe it."
Dex leaned closer. "You're stalling."
Jackson dropped his gaze to the floor. "I am." He coughed and raised his head. "Teddi's been using mental telepathy to speak with me, but upstairs we both actually saw her."
Dex merely nodded.
Dex's poised reaction puzzled Jackson. "Don't you find the mental telepathy bit a little strange?"
"I sure would," a feminine voice proclaimed beside them.
Teddi's apparition materialized in an empty chair at their table. Both men jumped, startled. She was dressed in a faded blue hospital gown.
"You guys going to stay down here all day? I could really use some company," she chastised them.
"We were just . . ."
"Don't talk out loud, Jackson, or people will think you're a nutcase. Talk to me with your mind."
"Will that work for me, too?" Dex asked her.
"Sorry, but I can't speak to you mentally," she replied. "I can hear you talk out loud when I'm in this state."
Jackson avoided staring at her when he spoke mentally. "And what state is that, exactly."
"Sort of an out-of-body experience. I thought you knew that."
"I'm not one of those psychics."
The chalky apparition laughed. "You mean a back-alley psychic? I guess I had you pegged all wrong."
Jackson cringed.
"Why him?" Dex interrupted gruffly. "How come you can only get in his mind?"
"He's the psychic, remember?"
Dex folded his arms and sulked.
"How're you feeling?" Jackson asked, unable to make sense of this phenomenon.
"Like shit. I have this terrific headache, and my arms and legs tingle. It feels like I'm tripping on that hallucinogen Dr. George mentioned. Everything's so surreal."
"Hopefully the drugs will wear off soon." Jackson forced a grin. How is she doing this? Logically, her newfound ability defied reason. No drug he'd ever heard about was capable of producing such an incredible effect. There must be someone manipulating her, but who?
"That wasn't a very flattering line of reasoning," Teddi snapped at Jackson. "Look, I had faith in you, and look what happened. Something in the drug Swinson injected me with did cause this Gypsy psychic power. Nobody's pulling my strings."
"Stay out of my private thoughts!" he replied angrily.
"Wish I could, but I'm hardwired into your crazy noggin."
"Then sever it now!"
She gave him a nasty half-grin. "No can do. I don't have the know-how."
"Then I'm leaving." Jackson scooted his chair back. "This investigation's over for me. Stopping Swinson was all I signed on for."
"It's not over, Jackson --- not by a long shot." Teddi's apparition looked at Dex, who had only heard one side of their conversation. "We've got big trouble ahead, Dex."
He glanced at her. "We've got our man. What else is there left to investigate?"
"I keep seeing these huge killer orange eyes," Teddi confessed.
"I told you to stay out of my head!" Jackson warned her.
"I wasn't in your head. I saw them in Swinson's mind before he died."
Dex studied Jackson questioningly.
The apparition straightened. "You've seen them, too, haven't you, Jackson?"
"No," he lied weakly.
"Liar." She rested her chin on her hand. "Hmm, you couldn't have seen them today out on Demon Key," she said thoughtfully. "Or else you would've told Dex."
"Just forget it, okay?" Jackson implored her.
"Not a chance." The airy fingers of her other hand drummed noiselessly on the table. "Ah ha! I've got it! You saw them in your vision at the motel."
"What if I did. They have no relevance to this case."
"The hell they don't!"
Jackson stood. "Nice to have met you, Dex. I'm headed back to Louisiana tonight. Good luck with our lady."
Dex leaned back in his chair. "It's been interestin' around here since you arrived, I'll say that much. Don't worry about Teddi. I'll take real good care of our girl."
"I'll hold you to it."
"Jackson, you can't leave us now!" Teddi shouted into his mind.
His brows arched. "Give me one good reason why I should stay."
"This case isn't over. In fact, it's just getting started."
Jackson threw his head back and laughed. "You're repeating yourself."
"Look, I don't know exactly why this isn't over. It's just intuition. I wish I could offer you specifics," she responded. "Maybe it's Ike's Indian folklore."
"That's only superstitious mumbo-jumbo." He paused. "Not good enough, kiddo. See you 'round." He left the hospital and settled into the back of the limousine.
"Drive me to the airport," he instructed the black-capped driver, and closed his weary eyes. The rain pounded the roof like a wild pony stampede. Thunderous lightning speared the ground every half-minute, escalating his angst.
Once Jackson's chartered plane was cruising through the peaceful, cloudless skies above the Gulf of Mexico, he chilled out. He was out of range of Teddi's mystifying telepathy, and his mind was his own private domain once more.
Teddi's intuition had hit the bull's-eye. Something was rotten in Denmark, or Gator Creek in this case. Their investigation was far from over.
He'd lied to Dex and Teddi in the hospital, and they bought it hook, line, and sinker, because they scarcely knew him. He grinned. Charlie Simmons wouldn't have chomped that same bait. The FBI assistant director was well aware of his bayou friend's relentless curiosity. Too well at times. Charlie would've instinctively realized that his old fishing buddy would never abandon so many loose ends.
Jackson had ostensibly fled Gator Creek to move on to another assignment, but he actually needed to escape spying eyes and minds --- he still believed there was someone else responsible for Teddi's comatose state. Swinson's real killer. The one who had set the kidnapper up at the school for the fall.
Jackson kicked off his shoes and propped them on the facing seat. When he dug up a few more answers, he would return; he fervently hoped that he wouldn't be too late.
The monstrous creature floated in the blackness swathing the modest lake below the Swinson mausoleum. The massive muscles in its powerful tail were strangely wilted, and its senses were dulled from hunger, but it managed to perceive the changing of the guard. Its nostrils acknowledged the scent of its new provider above the lake, but it still felt disorientated. The new provider failed to supply it with food.
Hunger pangs aroused its primordial hunting instincts. The long tail moved sluggishly from side to side as it again checked the shore for another meal offering.
Nothing.
The tail flopped angrily, and the violent splashes echoed eerily in the dark. When its hunger ultimately escalated to a savage rage, it would abandon its lake home and pursue its new provider.
And hunt for food along the way.
Lots of it.
Teddi lay alone in her hospital room in the dead of night, staring at the antiseptic white ceiling. She was completely bored --- brain dead. If someone would only play an audio book for her, it would certainly help pass the time.
Dex had left for home last night after keeping her company. She attempted in vain to speak to Jackson, but he was beyond the limits of her new ability.
Her only companions at this hour were the nurses who changed her bedpan --- how embarrassing --- and Dr. George, who definitely wasn't a conversationalist. He checked her, probed her, and recorded the data from the monitors beeping beside her bed, but that was the extent of his social skills. No cheerful good morning or how are you doing today, Teddi? His eye examinations made her self-conscious, but there was no way she could avoid his detached stare.
God, how much longer was this damn coma going to last?
She tried not to think about how those poor conscious women felt while Swinson mutilated their bodies. It must have been beyond horrible, but she couldn't dwell on it. Imagining their terror would only serve to drive her over the edge.
She was approaching that mental status fast enough without the horror stories.
Dex jumped out of bed early the next morning after a restful sleep, arrived at work before the reporters began their daily vigil, and made a strong pot of coffee. After the hot water finished dripping through the coffee grounds and filter, he poured himself a cup of the black poison and stretched out behind his desk. He reread his scribbled notes describing his visit with Ike Noonan, and then rechecked the old newspaper articles. Nothing new, like he figured. He scanned his notes concerning the local Indian monster sighting in the Everglades during the flood years, but they didn't lead him anywhere, either. He needed substantial facts. Indisputable ones that actually led somewhere.
If the Indians were correct, and Dex hoped to God they weren't, then his top priority would be to track down and dispatch the so-called monster before it could begin its killing spree. Hell, maybe it had already killed some people, and nobody had discovered the bodies yet. But, with all the nasty storms this spring, most people were smart enough to stay clear of the swamp --- he hoped.
Dex drained his coffee mug and slipped on his plastic-covered hat. It was time to consult an expert about this Indian legend, and he knew where to find one.
The Coconut Creek Casino.
Unlike Dex, Jackson hadn't slept at all that night. Instead, he chose to mine the government databases for information on the Swinson family of Demon Key, and he didn't discover much. But he remained optimistic.
The last family entry listed in the Florida census records was for Edward and Hilda Loggins, circa 1840. A furniture maker and a housewife. There were no further records of any kind. No kids. No connections to other Swinsons throughout the country.
Jackson explored the IRS and Census Bureau files, too, but came up empty. It was almost as if the Swinsons didn't exist after 1900. He glanced absently at the shallow, dark pool at the bottom of his wineglass and the blackened stub of his Cuban cigar. What had he missed?
He yawned and peered outside. The dawn broke gray and ominous. The slow-moving upper-level low that had dumped nine inches of rain across South Florida the past few days was headed up to Louisiana. He wasn't certain that his psyche could handle more rain and its accompanying gloom.
He ran credit reports for the last name Swinson, but none resided in Florida. Another dead end. He stood and paced the area in front of the large window. He watched Zeus chase a nutria rat through the high grass along the riverbank, barking and snapping at the large rodent's tail.
Jackson snapped his fingers and returned to his computer. Within seconds, he pulled up the property records for Demon Key. His desk chair creaked as he leaned back.
Loggins again.
In 1843, Edward Loggins purchased the Everglades property and named it Loggins Key, a mere eight years after Florida had declared statehood. Jackson cross-referenced Loggins with the Florida state census and tax roles. There weren't any.
Next, he checked the local territorial land affairs records and discovered that Loggins had a wife and five young children when he bought the property. There was a brief notation at the bottom of the record stating that Loggins and a son abandoned the key without making an effort to sell it in 1849. It became the property of the state, and three years later Si Swinson purchased the key, a year before Florida seceded from the Union and joined the Confederate States of America.
Jackson was amazed that these historical land documents still existed. He scrolled down the screen. Swinson's previous address on the bill-of-sale was listed as Bogotá, Brazil!
Fascinating.
His mental wheels spun faster.
Jackson examined the local death records for that time and uncovered five entries for the Edward Loggins family. He absently stroked his chin as he perused the entries.
It was unbelievable.
The thirty-one-year-old Hilda Loggins, his wife, had died from an alligator attack. Three-year-old James had succumbed to scarlet fever. Martha, eleven, had also died from an alligator attack. Ditto for George, six, and William, twelve.
Impossible!
Everybody knew that alligators dragged their tenderized victims to a shallow cave or a space beneath a log to be eaten later. But according to the coroner's reports, the alligators' masticated victims were found floating in the water around the key.
Jackson slapped the table. Something else must've killed them! Something with teeth similar to an alligator. Something that killed for sport. Cruel sport.
He pictured the orange eyes from his vision, and he thought about poor Teddi, who had seen them, too. Something clicked in his head, and he phoned Charlie Simmons in Washington.
"Hey, buddy, nice work down in Florida," Charlie greeted him, his caller ID identifying Jackson as the caller.
"Thanks. You heard about Teddi?" he asked shortly, terminating the chitchat.
Charlie sighed. "Yes. It's terrible. That woman has a promising future with us." He sighed again. "If Teddi doesn't improve in a week, I'm flying her up to Bethesda."
"Who do you have stationed down in the Amazon rainforest?"
"Now that's an odd question, even for you," Charlie replied. "You serious?"
"Absolutely."
"Why, may I ask, do you need that information?"
"I have my reasons."
"Playing it close to the vest, huh? All right, hang on a minute." There was a long pause. "Okay, I've got a whole team down there helping out the DEA. What're you looking for in particular?"
"Someone who knows local poisons. Tribal stuff."
"Poisons? Are you working a new case already?"
"In a way."
Charlie reluctantly gave him the name and satellite phone number for the agent. "I suppose you're going to keep me in the dark on this till our fishing trip this August?"
"Maybe not. My idea's a long shot, but if it pans out, you'll be the first to know."
Dex parked his Impala behind the Seminole Indian Casino in Coconut Creek, a town just east of Coral Springs. He strode through the muggy air and entered the windowless building. He sauntered up to the snack bar and asked for John Redfeather. The attendant nodded, her long black braids shifting across her breasts. She marched swiftly through the casino and disappeared behind a heavy office door.
A dark-skinned man of twenty-eight appeared in the open doorway, waved at Dex, and made his way through the maze of slot machines and frenetic players.
He shook hands with the police chief. "Looking to risk a little of your retirement fund, Dex?" His white teeth gleamed when his lips parted into a wide grin. His black eyes exhibited tremendous energy and enthusiasm as they examined his guest's deeply tanned, somber face. John rapidly concluded that his friend wasn't there for recreational purposes.
"Nah, not today, John. I don't feel lucky enough."
"Then you're smart to hold on to your fortune."
Dex chuckled and took off his hat. "Yeah, my fortune. I like that."
"So what brings you to the casino? You investigating one of our employees?" John and his father operated the casino for the Seminole tribe.
"Nothing like that. You still got that paleontology degree?"
It was John's turn to laugh. "You mean that worthless piece of paper that says I learned enough to stay poor all my life?"
"That's the one."
He squinted questioningly at Dex. "You find some ancient fossil or something?"
"Nope." Dex scratched his head. "I want you to help me find one."
"A fossil?"
Dex shuffled his feet. "Sorta. Only this fossil might still hunt and kill."
"Oh no, you're not talking about the Miccosukee Everglades monster, are you?"
"I guess I am," he replied uneasily.
John slapped Dex's shoulder. "Never figured you for a myth type of guy."
"That makes two of us, but I have a hunch that before all is said and done, we'll both be believers."
Dex had piqued John's interest. "Really? Hmm."
"Can you help me or not?"
"Well, sure. When do you want to start?"
"How about now?"
"Now!" He whistled, but when he saw that Dex was serious, he added, "I'll see if my father'll cover for me today."
"Thanks."
Within twenty minutes, they were riding in the Impala's front seat headed for the west end of Sample Road, where John docked his airboat.
"So what can you tell me about Demon Key?" Dex asked.
"Bad mojo. If my grandfather told me one story, he musta told me fifty."
"Tell me a good one."
"Well, first, you need a little background. Florida used to be a lot wider than it is today, and where the Everglades is now used to be arid land."
"A desert?"
"Yeah. More than twice as large as it is now, when the sea levels of both the Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico were much lower than today. People didn't show up in Florida until about 12,000 years ago. They were basically small-game hunters and gatherers, although there were large animals roaming around that are extinct now."
"Like what?" Dex was fascinated. He'd never heard these facts before, and he'd lived in Florida all his life.
"Like, uh, mastodons, saber-tooth tigers, giant armadillos, and some others."
"No shit? Saber-tooth tigers? I always thought they were myths, too."
"Oh yeah, they were real all right. My grandfather said that when the seas rose and half of the state was reclaimed by the oceans, these giant monsters disappeared."
"How's he know that?"
John appeared uneasy. "He found some early cave drawings that told the story."
"That's some story. Where's the cave?"
"I'm going to take you there."
They reached the dock, and Dex parked under the rain protection of a southern magnolia tree, while John prepared the airboat. The craft was a three-seater powered by a Cessna aircraft engine. Its top-end speed was 110 miles per hour, and it could reach that speed cruising on the water or saw grass during dry seasons.
John's sixty-three-year-old father, James, had taken it out a few years ago and had been traveling at sixty miles per hour when he hit a stump. He had been launched high into a stand of trees a half-mile from Alligator Alley. Although he had sustained a broken arm, leg, and three ribs, he had managed to climb down and make it to the highway, where a sympathetic motorist had stopped and driven him to the closest hospital. The Redfeathers were a hardy lot.
A patch of blue appeared in the quilt of grays and blacks overhead. A few rays of welcome sunshine warmed the two men and temporarily relieved the gloom.
Dex climbed on board, and John fired up the engine.
"Hold on and keep your hands inside. I don't want that saw grass slicing and dicing your arm into sushi," John warned him.
Dex nodded. He was well aware of what the serrated edges of the saw grass blades could do. "You bet."
The airboat sailed over the high waters past small hardwood tree islands, through mangrove tunnels, and across several lakes before they reached their destination. Dex peeked at the speedometer several times during their trip and noted that they were only traveling eighty miles per hour. Thank God John was taking it easy on him.
John eased the angled bow onto the sandy shore of a small island an hour and a half later and cut the engine. He tossed an anchor out into the muck, grabbed a black duffel bag, and jumped onto the island. Dex followed him into the cool shade beneath a woven canopy of tree branches.
"Here," John announced, and brushed a blanket of leaves from an old trapdoor. He bent and tugged on the steel ring. The door creaked open and fell flat against the leafy ground.
Dex pointed. "Down there?"
John reached into the duffel bag and threw Dex a powerful flashlight. "Yeah."
Dex guided the beam into the opening and illuminated a shallow limestone cave and a ladder. John nudged him aside and climbed down into the cave.
"Your shoes and pants are going to get a little soggy."
"I've got more at home." Dex joined his friend in knee-deep water below.
The blue patch of sky was quickly swallowed by another approaching storm. Rumbles sounded in the distance.
John's expression was stolid red granite. "Follow me, and watch your step if you don't want a dunking. The floor in here's as slippery as ice."
They cautiously waded into the silent shadows to their left, the bobbing beams skimming the limestone walls and ceiling like darting specters. Dex noticed weatherworn paintings on both sides of the tunnel that depicted deformed and evil-looking creatures. He shivered and hurried after John.
The water deepened, and it felt like they were descending at a slight angle. The water level reached his waist, then his chest. How much farther?
Finally they came upon a large circular chamber. Dex guessed its diameter to be close to fifty or sixty feet. The dome roof was broken by a myriad of gnarled tree roots, and water dripped into the pond covering the chamber floor. John's flashlight beam roamed the decorated walls until he located what he was searching for.
"Over here," he called out.
They moved closer to the paintings, and John nodded toward a series of faded pictures that were barely visible.
"If you look closely, you can make out the history of the first Florida inhabitants. They hunted small animals like the squirrels drawn here, gathered berries and nuts, and lived in small huts. This was long before my tribe appeared."
Dex admired the artistry of such a primitive culture. The human figures, animals, and objects were remarkably well drawn. Slowly, John guided him around the chamber. Each set of drawings was successively brighter and more colorful, and the historical representations more recent, until they came to a section where the drawing style changed drastically. The depictions were more realistic.
"Seminole," John pointed out proudly. "Now, many centuries passed from the previous pictures to this one. Notice that the Seminole landscape is marshy and watery, while the older ones displayed solid ground, thickets, and scrub." He waded to a spot twenty feet away.
"Here's what you're looking for," he told Dex.
"What we're looking for," he corrected his friend.
"Right." John ran his large hand over the pictures. "More Seminole. See that creature?"
Dex peered at the strange-looking monster. It appeared to be a giant alligator of some sort, with an eel tail, and legs and feet that resembled flat paddles.
"That it?" he asked.
"Yeah." John pulled a camera from his duffel and snapped several digital pictures, until he was satisfied with the results.
Dex tapped his finger on the final drawings of the set. "It appears as if the monster destroyed the whole damn village."
John smiled. "Pretty good for an amateur paleontologist. In fact, the rest of the sets tell the story of your creature and the destruction it wrought, including the annihilation of entire village populations."
Dex gestured at a blackened section of the wall between the old drawing and those by the Seminole tribe. "What happened there?"
John frowned. "I was wondering the same thing. Looks as if the drawings there were burned away."
Dex shook his head. "Strange. I wonder who'd do something like that?"
"Vandals, and it looks recent."
John rubbed his fingertips over the area and inspected them. They were blackened with soot. "Real recent."
"You remember what was there before?"
"Nah. The last time I saw these drawings was when I was a snot-nosed kid."
"Well, at least we have these drawings of the monster," Dex sighed.
"Yeah, I suppose. On the bright side, we got what we came for. Now we can take these photos to Florida Atlantic University's library and try to identify the creature. Unfortunately, I didn't save many of my college books. I sold them for beer money."
"Well, a guy's gotta drink. So, where do we start? It's a big library."
"When do we start is more like it. I have a sneaking suspicion that if this monster really existed, and I'm not saying that it did, it was a refugee from the Jurassic or Cretaceous periods. Hell, maybe both."
"What periods?"
"The age of the dinosaurs. They died out about sixty-five million years ago."
"So how could it be hanging around here if it's extinct?"
"That's a damned good question, Dex. Maybe we'll get lucky and find out."
If the Swinsons had emigrated from Brazil, maybe the poison injected into Teddi had, too. Jackson wasted no time phoning the FBI's rainforest poison expert, Art Holloway, but all he got was the agent's voicemail. Jackson left a message, and then made a whopping mess in the kitchen building himself a stacked Dagwood sandwich. When he was half through his monstrous creation and a bottle of Moosehead ale, his sat phone rang. He snatched it from the center of the table.
"LaFevre?"
"Right."
"Art Holloway here. What can I do for you?" he asked guardedly, uncertain of exactly who he was speaking to.
"Charlie Simmons gave me your number," Jackson began. "I've got an FBI agent up here in Florida who's been victimized by an unknown poison." He explained Teddi's condition and the fact that the suspect's family had come to America from Brazil.
Agent Holloway's tone was more relaxed. "That's a tall order, LaFevre. There are so many voodoo-like concoctions down here, it would be difficult to nail it without the actual poison . . . or perhaps a sample of her blood."
"I could ship you the blood."
"You could, and I might get it a month from now. I'm out in the middle of nowhere."
"Can you give me the location of the nearest town?"
"This is a scrambled call, right?"
"My phone's receiving your call in scramble mode."
"All right, I guess it wouldn't hurt. I'm close to Manaus, Brazil."
"Oh God, you are in the middle of the soup down there."
Manaus sat near the junction of the Negro and Amazon Rivers in the northern Brazilian state of Amazonas. It was the chief port for the region's far-reaching river system, making it a drug smuggler's paradise. The tourist trade was its second economical resource, making it easy for foreign smugglers to assimilate.
"Shit'd be more like it," Holloway grumbled. "It's hotter than a bitch, and a mosquito here could feed a family of four."
Jackson chuckled. "Any airstrip nearby?"
"A small private one, but it's under water half the time. You could land a chopper on the high ground."
"Where do I latch on to a chopper?"
"We all flew into Paramaribo, Suriname. It's a hop, skip, and a jump by chopper from there."
Jackson heard staccato bursts of automatic weapons in the background. "I'll call you when I leave Florida."
"Remember, I'm not promising you any results."
"I wouldn't believe you if you did." Jackson heard a sharp intake of breath.
"Hey, aren't you that psychic guy the agency uses occasionally?"
"I confess."
Agent Holloway laughed. "Maybe you can give these shamans down here a run for their money." The exchange of gunfire sounded closer. "Gotta run."
"Goodbye, Art, and stay low."
Jackson contacted the bureau and requested that they prepare his travel arrangements to Manaus, and then he phoned Dr. George and told him what he needed done. While the doctor whined about being overworked, Jackson absently flicked the whistle-flute necklace that dangled on a pushpin stuck in his kitchen message board.
It was a reminder that this was the strangest investigation he'd ever undertaken.
Jackson arrived at Holy Cross Hospital late that afternoon. The weather hadn't changed a bit, except that the road ponding was deeper than before. He stomped the rain from his shoes and shook his umbrella before entering the lobby. When he stepped from the elevator, he was pleased to see that the three FBI agents were still deployed outside Teddi's door. They waved as he passed them and stepped into her room.
Like the rain outside, Teddi's condition hadn't changed, either. She lay there, motionless, and stared wide-eyed at the ceiling. He was surprised that she didn't use her telepathy on him as soon as he entered the room.
He leaned over her face so she could recognize her visitor.
"Thought you were gone for good," she said, directing the softly spoken words into his mind.
"I had some things to take care of," he said evasively. "How are you doing?"
"I think I'm getting worse."
Jackson frowned. "Doc George says your vitals are holding steady."
"He can't see inside my brain."
"Meaning?"
"It means that I'm hearing voices," she replied, exasperated.
Jackson stiffened. "Voices? What are they saying?"
"That's just it, I can't understand them."
"There's more than one?"
"I . . . I think so. They sound different anyway."
"Are they speaking in various languages?"
"Maybe, but it sounds more like the words are all garbled --- like run together."
He pursed his lips and clasped his hands together. "They might be talking so fast that you can't comprehend the words."
"Y-e-a-h, maybe you're right." She paused. "Jackson, I'm scared. You've got to help me."
He leaned over and planted a kiss on her forehead. "Teddi, that's just what I'm going to do."
Dr. George pushed the door open and handed him a sealed vial of blood. "Here's Teddi's blood sample. I had it drawn an hour ago," he said brusquely. "Personally, I think that you're wasting your time."
"Well, since your international databases have failed to identify the unknown toxin, I can't do any worse, can I?"
Dr. George glowered at him. "Well, it is your time." With that, he turned in a huff and beat a hasty retreat.
"Whose blood's that?" Teddi asked. "Mine?"
"Yeah, yours." He quickly described his idea, leaving out some of the vital details. He didn't quite trust Teddi and her voices.
"If that's your plan, there's one basic flaw."
He arched his brows quizzically. "And what's that?"
"That's not my blood in the vial you're holding. Nobody's drawn it since I first arrived."
Brothers Morris and Munro Lapis sat quietly in the their fifteen-foot johnboat a hundred yards south of Demon Key and watched their twitching Rapalas on the rain-rippled surface. A five-foot Florida gar's wavy silhouette passed between the boat and a stretch of saw grass and swamp lilies in the shallows, but didn't strike their bass lures.
Both Lapis brothers were in their fifties, with Munro approaching sixty. They were Everglades fishing veterans from diapers to the present, and they kept a wary lookout for invading alligators that loved to mooch off their fish stringers. So far, there were only three bass on their stringer.
Munro's pate was sun-spotted clean, while Morris sported a full head of tangled silver locks that reached his shoulder blades. Both were thin and wiry, and clutched a bottle of beer in one hand and a fiberglass rod in the other. Their rugged faces were wrinkled raisins, and their mouths had large gaps between tobacco-mottled teeth.
Morris cast his lure back out into the water. Rainwater leaked through his rain jacket and dampened the front of his blemished white tee shirt. He swore and slowly reeled in the lure. With the water levels high like this, the bass drifted farther south in greater numbers than usual. Bites were far and few between. Morris glanced at his stone-faced brother, who stared blankly into the saw grass.
"What's eatin' you?" Morris demanded.
"Nothin'"
"Nothin' shit!"
"If you must know, I was jest wonderin' where all the gators was, that's all. We ain't seen one the whole fuckin' day," Munro replied, with a shrug.
"Yeah, you gotta point. I wonder where the fuck they're hidin'?"
Munro cocked his head toward Demon Key. "Mebbe it's got somethin' to do with that place."
Morris followed his gaze. "Ya mean the monster? Shit, Munro, you're closin' in on sixty, and you ain't never laid eyes on no monster out here."
Munro cast his lure into the swamp lilies and slowly reeled it back toward the boat. "Hey, don't crawl over my shit, hear? I was just wonderin', that's all," he drawled sullenly. "There ain't no law against that!"
Morris laid his empty beer bottle at his feet on its side, opened the mud-splattered blue cooler, and grabbed another brew. He popped the cap from the amber bottleneck with his remaining left molars and spit the cap into the water.
It appeared as if it was going to be a long, fruitless day. They hadn't had a strike in an hour. He silently cursed the foul weather.
The creature slid through the slender breach in the notched limestone wall that divided the cavern lake from the swamp encircling the key. It immediately sensed food close by and swam cautiously in that direction.
A twelve-foot gator resembling a rotting log floated lazily atop the water. Only its protruding eyes betrayed its presence.
The grotto creature immediately spotted the alligator at the surface and silently moved into an attack position so as not to alert its enemy. After swimming within striking range, the creature's tail propelled it upward, and its great jaws seized the gator's armored body and elevated it high into the air. Both dropped back into the water with a tremendous explosion of water.
The stunned alligator thrashed in the crushing grip; its tail frantically lashed out at the creature, but slapped only water. The cone-shaped teeth crushed the gator's armored skin, severing both the head and tail. The creature released the lifeless body, unfit for consumption. It had successfully defended its territory.
It quickly continued south beneath the swamp's now placid surface, searching for that meal.
Munro leaped from his seat at the raucous struggle north of them in the mist and nearly swamped the johnboat. "What in the Sam Hill was that? Sounded like a damn plane crashed!" he hollered.
"Dunno," Morris replied, his voice anxious. "Now sit the hell down before you swamp the boat and drop us both into the drink!"
Reluctantly, Munro eased his taut frame onto the seat and rapidly reeled in the lure.
An alligator bellowed loudly as if in terrible agony.
"Jesus, what could be tormentin' a bull gator like that?" Munro shouted. "Let's get the hell outta here."
Morris glared at his chickenshit older brother. "Have it your way."
Munro realized that Morris was as scared as he was, or he would've pitched a fit at quitting their favorite pastime.
The swamp suddenly fell silent. There wasn't a sound except the rain plinking into the water and the saw grass rustling in the breeze.
Munro retrieved the muck-glazed anchor from the bottom, and then plucked another sweaty bottle of beer from the cooler. Morris spit on his arthritic hands and vigorously rubbed them together before gripping the pull cord of their antique Johnson forty--horse outboard engine. He was about to yank the cord for all he was worth when a giant shadow swam beneath their boat.
Munro's beer bottle crashed to the bottom and rolled on its side, seeping fizzing amber fluid.
"What the hell . . ."
Morris swallowed hard. "Kinda looked like a gator."
"Gator, my ass! That tail was more like a Conger eel's."
"And the fucker was near fifty feet long!" Morris exclaimed breathlessly.
The johnboat spun gently in a circle from the creature's powerful wake.
Munro leaned over the edge. "You see it?"
Morris peered over the opposite side. "Nah. Musta kept goin'"
"Thank the Lord!"
Morris wasted little time re-gripping the pull cord. He gave a fierce yank, but the engine only sputtered and coughed oily fumes.
"C'mon, baby," Morris whispered. He pulled again. More choking fumes. More coughs.
"Kick the son-of-a-bitch!" Munro shouted.
Morris shook his head in exasperation. "You think kickin' is the cure for everythin'. That's why you ain't got a wife no more."
"No need to bring up Nelly. She was a no-good louse."
"And you're the no-good drunk who beat her."
Munro knotted his fingers into fists. "Jest shut the fuck up, Morris! You don't know shit. Nelly was a frigid bitch who deserved everythin' she got."
"Except you." He inhaled deeply and tried to put his aching finger joints out of his mind. "C'mon, sweet baby."
The engine coughed, vibrated, and finally roared to life.
"Let's put some distance between us and that giant . . . whatever the fuck it was," Morris yelled over the engine's smoking misfires.
Munro grunted, still piqued from his brother's unwarranted comments. They cut him to the quick, most likely because they were true. He grabbed the sticky beer bottle from the bottom and drained the few remaining swigs as the johnboat lurched forward.
It heard the dull growl and made a swift U-turn, hugging the reedy depths of the next island's southern boundary. The noisy dark shape moved sluggishly above, and occasionally there were strange faint noises like shrieking prey. Edible prey. Familiar prey.
The creature lingered until the chugging object moved directly overhead, before it erupted from the bottom and thrust its open jaws upward at a frightening speed. The grotto creature's inertia launched its head and half of its bluish-gray body out of the water. Its jaws closed forcefully on the johnboat and crushed it into mangled metal in seconds.
Morris's and Munro's arms and legs flailed impotently in the air as they plummeted toward the water. Their eyes were riveted on the enormous monster, as it plunged downward beside them and proceeded to chew their johnboat into aluminum splinters in its elongated, alligator-like mouth.
Morris prayed for salvation, while his brother cursed the monster for wrecking their boat and destroying their tackle. Morris knew their only chance of escaping death was for the creature to regard them as trivial morsels and resume its journey.
Munro screamed at the creature and angrily smacked the water. The monster released the remnants of the johnboat and surged toward the puny surface creature. It sensed the prey's fear, which intoxicated it --- amplifying its appetite and honing its predatory instincts like blood exciting a shark.
It seized Munro's legs and torso below the surface and dragged his vulnerable form to the bottom. The creature's powerful mouth repeatedly opened and closed on its victim, and used the four rows of teeth on the roof of its mouth to force the bloody meat farther down its throat. Its flexible jaw joints finally parted, and its throat expanded. The creature swallowed Morris Lapis whole, like one of the local pythons. The outline of Munro's rigid body obtruded from the seal-like skin at the creature's throat before finally disappearing into its stomach.
Morris swam for all his scrawny ass was worth toward Demon Key, while the monster was busily munching his brother. The shoreline suddenly appeared in the mist like a welcome mirage in the heat-choked desert. If he could only reach it before the beast resurfaced, he would survive the day. Mind-boggling terror spurred his arms and legs to greater effort. He resisted the urge to look back --- to see if death was nipping at his heels. Instead, his eyes never left the shore.
His fingers knifed through an armada of lily pads and then collided with the muddy shore. As Morris scrambled past the cemetery markers on his way up the hillock toward the mausoleum, his feet slipped on the slick grassy surface as if it were green ice.
He was two grave rows from the top and was thinking about relaxing, when he suddenly noticed a vast black stain on the hillock. His feet clambered like spinning tires, but failed to achieve traction.
The fifty-three-foot, eighteen-ton creature fell to earth, crushing Morris to a memory and driving the markers down deeper into the graves. After swallowing its crushed snack, it utilized its four wide, flat paddle appendages to push its ponderous frame down the slippery slope and into the mist-shrouded waters.
Its appetite temporarily sated, the creature swam swiftly south toward the Florida Keys and the Gulf of Mexico in search of its new food provider.
Dex dropped John Redfeather off at the casino and returned to the police station. He found Special Agent Wilkerson and his usual gang of idiots talking excitedly.
"What's up, guys?" Dex asked, although he really didn't care if they answered or not. He was just making polite conversation.
Ryan Wilkerson pivoted toward Dex. "We're planning a complete investigation of Demon Key. The heavy crime scene hitters from Washington are en route as we speak, bringing along some of our most state-of-the-art equipment. By the weekend, we should be ready to rock'n'roll."
Dex fought the urge to read them the riot act. "Sounds to me like you're planning to bulldoze the whole friggin' island!"
"Does it?" Ryan replied caustically. "You ought to show up and watch. Maybe you could learn something."
"Maybe I will." Dex strode into his office and slammed the door. What was Wilkerson hoping to accomplish out on Demon Key? More than likely, the smart-ass didn't even know, himself. Clueless, that's what Wilkerson was.
Dex rifled through the meager stack of papers that his secretary-dispatcher, Judy Hanson, had placed on his desk. Most pertained to his ad in the Fort Lauderdale Sun for a new patrolman. There were eleven responses. He sighed heavily. Now came the drudgery of background checks and interviews.
He left the office and instructed Wilkerson to lock up when he left. The agent barely acknowledged the police chief with a waggling forefinger. Dex drove home, took a long hot shower to cleanse away the rain and clammy perspiration. Afterward, he flicked on the local six-o'clock news, Action-10, and caught the lead story. He froze.
A live video feed showed hundreds of alligators that had abandoned the swamps, lakes, and canals and invaded streets, backyards, and parking lots. The most bizarre shot was a chopper videotape of a three-mile section of Alligator Alley, Interstate 75. Alligators and a few crocodiles blanketed the six lanes and the grassy median just west of the Sawgrass Express interchange. If he didn't know better, Dex wouldn't have guessed that there was a highway beneath the vast gator sprawl.
" . . . and for some reason, the gators are fleeing the Everglades and adjacent waters in droves. Here's our Jeanine Smith standing at the Alligator Alley barricades with the report. Hi, Jeanine."
Jeanine Smith was a young, too-cute blond reporter fresh out of college. Her eyes danced from the opportunity to report a lead-in news story, but her apparel badly needed some refinement. Dex decided that her knit top hugged her big boobs too tightly and revealed a bit too much cleavage to be sophisticated and fashionable.
"Hi, Tom. The police and sheriff's departments' phone lines have been swamped from nervous residents reporting alligator invasions," she blurted out, in a voice a bit too shrill to Dex's liking. "The gators have eaten numerous cats and dogs that were unfortunate enough to be outdoors during this unusual event."
She turned sideways and pointed behind her, while the camera panned and zoomed in on the gator population covering the highway.
"As you can see, these gators have closed down Interstate 75 and snarled traffic as far west as Naples. Miami drivers have been rerouted to surface streets to get home, which are already overcrowded from the closing of the flooded Sawgrass Expressway. Florida State Highway Patrolmen have asked many drivers to get off the bottlenecked highway and spend the night in a local motel, while authorities figure out how to remove the thousands of gators from this busy artery between Naples and Miami. FHP told me earlier that it could become a risky proposition to sleep out here in your car in this snarled traffic, especially if this gator population decides to shift in your direction.
"I spoke with a local gator trapper this afternoon, and he told me that he had never seen or even heard of such a spectacle in his whole life. When I asked him what could have caused such an anomaly, he replied that they seemed to be scared to go back in the water. He and several of his professional associates attempted to coax a few of the gators back into the water, but those they managed to drive into the water quickly crawled back on land a short ways from the trappers' position."
Jeanine was clearly unconcerned with the problem. The situation was a boon to her credentials, and that's what mattered most. Dex could see it in her smug expression.
"Dr. Juan Cabrerra, a professor from the University of Miami, has kindly joined me out here." The camera image widened to allow a dark-complected, stocky, balding man to be seen standing next to the television reporter. "Dr. Cabrerra, have you ever seen anything like this?"
Cabrerra's wide smile displayed perfectly straight white teeth. "No, I haven't, and I've studied alligators and crocodiles around the world. This is an unprecedented occurrence, I can tell you that." He cleared a frog from his throat. "I would have to agree with that trapper who spoke to you earlier that these alligators have been forced ashore from something that has badly frightened them. It could be an unreported virus or bacteria in the water, or perhaps an underwater disturbance like an earthquake."
Jeanine jumped right in. "But wouldn't our scientists have noticed a seismic disturbance that large?"
The smile shrank. "Perhaps, but these creatures might be sensing a seismic disturbance that has yet to occur. Such animal behavior has been documented for centuries around the globe."
Jeanine tried her best to appear scholarly, but in Dex's eyes, she failed miserably.
"Some people are speculating that there's a predator loose in the Everglades that had frightened these gators," she commented, then shifted the microphone to her guest.
Cabrerra laughed loudly. "Like the Loch Ness monster?" He continued laughing. "That's not likely outside the realm of Sci-fi Channel entertainment."
"I see," she responded curtly, visibly perturbed at his rude swipe at her suggestion. She once again faced the camera, and the camera's image zoomed in on her. "Thank you, Dr. Cabrerra, from the University of Miami," she announced with a dismissive wave. "Well, Tom, as you can see, there's still no definitive answer for why the alligators have suddenly gone crazy and abandoned the Everglades. This is Jeanine Smith reporting live from Interstate 75 for Action-10 News."
The television picture cut back to a studio shot of the seated anchor, Tom Bradley. He shook his head solemnly. "This is straight from a Stephen King nightmare." He straightened the papers on his desk. "In a possibly related story, two men have been reported missing in the Everglades west of Gator Creek. Morris and Munro Lapis went out fishing this morning but didn't return. Their friends got worried when the brothers missed Morris's grandson's birthday party this afternoon. They called the Broward County Sheriff's Department and filed a missing persons report. Of course, the sheriff can't act until the Lapis brothers have been missing for twenty-four hours.
"But another fishing group saved the deputies an all-out search when they towed in what was left of the Lapis brothers' fishing boat. Here's a live view of the recovery at the Jinlow's Fish Camp dock." The Action-10 Sky Reporter hovered at the scene and zoomed in on the mangled craft, as deputies weathered the latest storm to remove it from the mucky shallows. The camera cut quickly to the four bearded men who found it. "These men told deputies that they found the boat nose down in shallow water south of Demon Key, and as you can plainly see, it's nearly broken in half." He grinned. "Maybe Jeanine was right about that Everglades monster.
"Sheriff Stark's department is remaining mum on the find, but we'll let you know the minute there is a released statement. Speaking of the weather, here's our own meteorologist . . ."
Dex turned off the television and tossed the remote control on the end table. Any jackass worth his salt could predict more rain tonight and tomorrow.
After drying his hair and dressing, he drove through a steady drizzle to Luke's Restaurant and Bar on Atlantic Boulevard in Pompano Beach. After giving Luke Russet his menu selection, Dex suddenly recalled his earlier conversation with Teddi at his office.
The kidnapper might need the women for some kind of sacrifice or ritual. If that's the case, then why now? What's so special about this time of year? Or what event has occurred to instigate the ritual?
Now that's what Ryan Wilkerson ought to be hunting for on Demon Key. Those questions would point him and his heavy crime scene hitters in the right direction. But, Dex was dead certain that if he mentioned Teddi's insightful ideas, Wilkerson would quickly reject them out of professional vanity and jealousy.
Dex scratched the gray stubble poking out from his chin. Maybe he and his new officer would have to beat the heavy hitters to the punch, and then a sudden inspiration suggested just who that officer might be. Dex was excited at the prospect, despite the new guy being a temporary, out-of-state employee who was a touch odd.
With that decided, Dex dug into the steaming barbequed ribs and coleslaw that Luke placed before him.
"Not your blood?" Jackson said via telepathy.
"No. I'm certain of it," Teddi replied, fear quivering her mental voice.
Jackson grabbed both her limp hands in his, and his body jerked from a tremendous psychic jolt. Suddenly he was inside her mind, but the experience was so fierce, he immediately realized that it was too dangerous for him to stay connected. He tried to release her hands, but for some reason, he couldn't. They were bonded.
Fiery orange eyes invaded his mind, and then a rumbling tsunami of frothy blood engulfed them in a single shuddering crush. Before he could react to the first horror, the monstrous wave turned and came for him! It curled and crested above him and . . . just hung there. The scene was so real --- so vivid --- that Jackson wanted to run, but he was completely under Teddi's spell.
A hideous, savage face splashed through the crimson wall, its mouth leering and its eyes fire coals from Hell. The features were vaguely familiar, but Jackson was so terrified that he couldn't quite grasp the name. His entire body trembled again, jarring his teeth, neck, and shoulder blades. The pain was excruciating.
Suddenly, the ominous wave faded to . . . a hospital room --- Teddi's room --- and the face in the wave morphed into a complete form. It was him --- Jackson LaFevre!
He panicked as his vision self approached Teddi's bed with a large knife clutched in one hand. His alter ego peered down at her beautiful face, helpless and inanimate. Jackson's real heart fluttered and skipped a beat, throwing the vision rhythm off kilter.
His sanity was teetering precariously like a tightrope acrobat on the edge of disaster. How could he be contemplating Teddi's murder? It didn't make sense! What kind of twisted morality had been thrust upon him? Her placid eyes reflected his gaze like mirrored ponds --- fishing ponds? --- and the reflection startled him. It was no longer his reflection! The face belonged to the murderous maniac in the blood wave! How was that possible?
Jackson was a prisoner inside his own body, and he found himself unable to save Teddi from the murderer who had pilfered his being. He took a deep breath and screamed a warning to her, but there was no sound. The scream was imagined. He wasn't in control of his physical actions.
Jackson watched as the knife tip penetrated Teddi's throat and deftly sliced her jugular vein. Tears flowed down his cheeks as a blood geyser erupted, cascading onto her white and blue striped hospital gown. Her radiant green eyes fluttered, then life's light died. He blinked once. Twice. Did he actually see what he thought he saw? Was there really a golden temple reflected in her eyes, or did he imagine the fleeting image?
The savage face turned toward Jackson and laughed mockingly. Again, the man's identity was on the tip of Jackson's tongue. His frustration was shoved aside when the murderer lifted the bloody knife and lunged at him.
Jackson screamed.
And the atrocious spell was broken.
His face was sweat-slick, but Jackson was grateful that it wasn't blood --- Teddi's blood. He wiped his face and noticed Teddi gazing up at him with her mesmerizing green eyes. The ones he had watched wither and die moments before. God, what was going on in that mind of hers? But was it hers? He felt as if he'd been propelled into a terrifying world beyond her mind into someone else's. Someone even more murderous than Bo Swinson. But who? He looked so familiar, and yet . . .
He nervously wiped his face again. Maybe he would find the answer in Brazil.
But there was one detail he was clear about. Teddi had lied to him. That was her blood in the vial Dr. George had given him. Jackson had sensed it briefly before the orange eyes appeared. But why would Teddi try to deceive him? Or was it someone else in her mind controlling her?
"What . . . what's the matter, Jackson? I lost you there for a minute." Teddi asked, worried.
He managed a smile, which was quite a feat after what he just endured, and told her that it was a normal symptom in comatose patients.
"Brazil?" she said out of the blue, startling him. "Are you going there?"
"Uh, yes, that's right."
"Well, be careful and hurry back."
He breathed a puff of relief. She didn't appear to know what his real objective was in South America.
He kissed her forehead so she could watch him do it, and then backed away.
"I'll return before you know it," he said mentally.
"I hope so. The other voices in my head are getting louder. More pushy."
"Keep the faith, Teddi." With that remark, he left the room and located Dr. George in the doctor's lounge munching on a sandwich. Jackson rapidly explained what he needed the doctor to do.
Dr. George stubbornly folded his arms across his chest. "I can't do that without a written order from Charlie Simmons."
"Then call him. I'll wait."
"I've got more important things to do first."
Jackson slipped his gun from its shoulder holster, slowly moved it beneath the table, and tapped the barrel against George's kneecap.
"If you don't do this now, then you'll be walking with a limp the rest of your life!" he threatened in a low voice. He was in no mood for Dr. George's childish antics after what he'd experienced in Teddi's mind.
"You wouldn't dare shoot me here in front of all these other doctors," he smirked, but it quickly vanished when he heard the metallic click. "Okay, okay, you win. I'll do it." He paused. "You're just as crazy as they said you were."
"Now," Jackson growled. "And I'll be watching so you don't renege on your promise."
An hour later, Jackson was in his limousine headed to a private airfield south of Miami in Homestead --- a very private field where a Harrier jet awaited him on a military airstrip. Jackson swallowed at the thought of traveling in it. Its history proved the vertical thrust design to be very unreliable.
"I thought these planes were one-seaters," Jackson remarked as the pilot stowed his gear in an outer side compartment and securely closed it.
The pilot, Jim Peterson, smiled slyly. "Oh, some of them like this baby have been slightly modified for non-combat missions. It'll be a cozy ride, but we'll make great time," he explained. He climbed up the ladder to the cockpit and motioned for Jackson to follow him.
After being outfitted with an oxygen mask and buckled tightly into a body-formed leather seat, Jackson maintained a white-knuckle grip while the Harrier's roaring vertical thrusters boosted them straight into the air. Without warning, the pilot goosed the throttle, and they shot forward as if launched from a cannon. The Gs pinned his body against the seat and distorted his face until it resembled a stretched latex mask.
After they reached their cruising altitude, Jackson was finally able to doze during their flight over the seemingly unending blue Caribbean waters. He hadn't gotten much sleep the past week during the investigation, and now his body was playing catch-up.
The pilot rudely jolted him awake with a sharp elbow to the ribs as they approached a small American airbase southwest of Paramaribo, Suriname. Julianatop, the country's highest mountain, rose ominously in the distance amid angry black thunderclouds.
"I was afraid we wouldn't make it before the predicted storms," the pilot announced over Jackson's headset. "But, it's expected. It's the rainy season down here."
Jackson slouched as far as the restraining safety harness allowed. More rain. Just what he needed, he thought facetiously.
The Harrier had no sooner touched down, and Jackson was sprinting toward a waiting Blackhawk helicopter --- another military aircraft with a spotty record. Maybe ole Charlie was trying to tell him something in a not-so-subtle manner.
A Jeep Wrangler was visible in the twilight storm beside a crude airfield cut out of the dense jungle, as the Blackhawk pilot dropped him off and flew away. Jackson ran through the deluge, which soaked his tropical linen clothing in seconds, and tossed his soggy duffel into the back. He climbed into the Jeep beside Art and brushed back his drenched white-blond hair with his fingertips. The men shook hands after hasty introductions. Special Agent Art Holloway was a forty-something with auburn hair and a no-nonsense demeanor.
Without another word, the FBI agent gunned the engine and shifted the Wrangler into first gear with a lurch.
"Where's the fire?" Jackson exclaimed, his nerves edgy from his two earlier flights.
Art stared straight ahead. "Got to get to the camp before night falls, and it comes damned fast down here."
"Afraid you'll get lost?" Jackson asked with an unsteady grin, part of him worried that he might be right.
"Hell no," Art grunted. "The animals get restless around that time. Pain in the ass, really."
"I've never heard that before, and I've been to South America several times."
Holloway chanced a quick glance at his companion. "Me neither, till last night."
Jackson frowned. "What exactly is going on?"
"There's a native word for it, but I can't think of it at the moment. It means something like animal bloodlust for humans."
"You mean animals are attacking people without provocation?"
"That's about the size of it."
"Does anyone know why?"
"The superstitious natives have all the answers. They believe we're all cursed."
"By who, for godsake?"
"Some weirdo supernatural something or other. Like an ancient god returned to life."
Jackson leaned back and tried to ignore his clinging wet clothes. Just what had he gotten himself into now?
The tropical rain ceased faster than Jackson could snap his fingers. The Wrangler's twin beams carved a tunnel through the darkness and ignited the rain droplets on the sagging leaves into fiery diamonds. The jungle growth was so close to the side of the road that it scratched the sides of the Wrangler. Holloway proceeded cautiously along the rutted one-lane dirt road and kept a sharp eye out for animals, especially jaguars.
"How far to the camp?" Jackson asked, fracturing the tension.
"Not far," he grumbled, and gripped the steering wheel even tighter.
A savage scream rattled Jackson's nerves. It sounded so close to the side of his face that he hurriedly rolled up the fogged window. He recognized the fierce cry as that of a jaguar, and it sounded ravenous.
"Told you," Holloway muttered. "The animals are fucking crazy around these parts."
He swung the Wrangler sharply around a corner; the tires slid out on the slick mud, but regained traction before the Jeep slammed into the jungle.
"Close one," Jackson said wanly. His stomach was a Mexican jumping bean.
"Here we are," Holloway announced, with a relieved sigh.
Jackson stared through the bug-streaked windshield and inspected the fog-shrouded campsite. It wasn't as primitive as he had expected. There were four dome prefab structures huddled in a small clearing, and there were air conditioners protruding from several windows. The parking area was river gravel, and the multiple banks of dazzling floodlights were perched atop towering wooden poles. Jackson was impressed.
Despite the primitive environment enveloping the facilities, three satellite dishes and a pair of powerful electric generators representing modern technology spoiled the natural splendor of the landscape, but Jackson was grateful for the link to civilization.
Several heavily armed gunmen patrolled the camp, and when they spotted the Wrangler, they pointed their automatic rifles at it. One of them approached the Jeep as Holloway maneuvered it into a tight parking space between two sizeable tree trunks. After a brief conversation, the guard retreated, and Holloway turned to Jackson.
"Let's get inside before it rains again. The weather changes at the drop of a hat in the rainforest."
"I'm well aware of that," Jackson replied curtly, as he grabbed his duffel bag and followed the agent inside.
They entered a large conference room that filled the center of the white dome. It was furnished with a folding conference table, chairs, a stocked bar, and a coffeemaker on a far table. A bank of six color surveillance monitors, displaying real-time perimeter surveillance video, obtruded from brackets on the left entry wall, and another two screens on the right wall monitored infrared images. He studied the four closed doors on each side of the room.
"Bedrooms," Holloway explained.
Two bearded men wearing camouflage outfits, and a pair of local tribesman were seated around the table. Holloway introduced Jackson.
"This the local chief, Demmy, and his medicine man, Yokie," Holloway said. "And this is Sam Desmond and Jeff Malloy."
Jackson nodded at the Indians. Their white painted faces were adorned with enough nose rings, cheek rings, and earrings to stock a small jewelry store. He shook hands with the solemn white men. Sam Desmond was tall, trim, and had closely cropped black hair. His narrow blue eyes regarded Jackson suspiciously. Jeff Malloy was blond, smug, and sported a rugged countenance.
A brief discussion yielded the core facts of the case. A regional drug smuggling ring operated close by, but the DEA and Brazilian troops weren't able to pinpoint their exact headquarters. Law enforcement officials had narrowed the search area to the junction of the Negro and Amazon rivers, but that still encompassed a lot of secluded land. Their surveillance people reported that the drugs were shipped down the Negro and moved east along the Amazon River toward Manaus.
Within the past six months, the DEA had relocated their camp three times, with each position closer to the drug source. But now their attempts to shut down the illegal trafficking was disrupted by an inexplicable outbreak of crazed jaguars and monkeys. The DEA and FBI satellite intelligence wasn't helping pinpoint the cause because of the heavy cloud cover.
"Obviously, we're getting closer to their center of operation," Desmond remarked, his eyes dulled by frustration and fatigue. "And so we think that the animal attacks on our personnel are somehow connected to the smugglers."
Malloy folded and unfolded his hands. "But we don't have one shred of evidence to support our theory." His expression was grim.
"Our friends Demmy and Yokie firmly believe that the attacks are caused by some kind of curse, and their warriors won't budge from their village to help us without a heavily armed escort," Desmond added.
The two Indians nodded gravely.
Jackson stood and stared at the monitors. "So, it appears that I won't get my antidote as long as those crazy critters are roaming the rainforest, is that it?"
Art Holloway shrugged. "That's about the size of it."
Jackson stood. "Then it looks like I'll have to take care of your animal pest problem." He moved toward the front entrance.
"Wait!" Holloway called. "You don't even know the lay of the land, LaFevre. You can't just march out there alone!"
The two painted tribesmen were stunned by Jackson's bold response.
"Just watch me." With that, Jackson stepped into the eerie illuminated fog and pulled the door closed behind him.
The night was bustling with animal calls and cries and endless insect buzzes and whines. The soaked leaves above the floodlights provided a steady sprinkling of rain beads, each landing with a splash-echo in the shallow puddles below. A distant jaguar snarl grabbed Jackson's immediate attention. His head jerked to the left, and against his better judgment, he stepped in that direction. Suddenly, a camp guard jumped out from his hidden position behind a generator and blocked his path.
"I wouldn't advise going into the jungle alone, sir," the burly sentinel warned.
"Thanks for the advice, but I'm quite capable of taking care of myself."
"I'm afraid that I can't permit you to go in there . . ."
With a rapid martial arts move, Jackson seized the guard's wrist, spun him around in a hammerlock, and stripped him of his assault rifle.
"One more objection and I break your arm," Jackson threatened in a gravelly timbre. "You understand?"
"Yeah, man . . . I do," he groaned, his voice strained with pain and embarrassment.
Jackson leveraged his foot into the small of the guard's back, stiffened his hamstring into a coiled spring, and launched the man forward. The guard went sprawling onto his face in a soupy puddle.
Jackson looped the assault rifle strap around his neck and disappeared into the pitch-black landscape beyond the reach of the floodlights. It took a few moments for his eyes to adjust to the contrast before he followed a beaten path winding through the undergrowth to who-knew-where. He didn't care where he was headed. His only ambition was to locate the killer jaguars that were harassing the natives and DEA crew.
The full moon exploded from cottony clouds and bathed the jungle in a ghostly luminosity. Dozens of wary eyes reflected the moonlight along the path, but none were large and predatory enough to be those of a jaguar. Jackson maintained his vigilant pace and didn't pause until the camp's glow faded to black. He listened.
Loud crackling and rustling sounded just ahead on the path, and Jackson quickly ducked into a shadowy tree hollow, hoping he wasn't invading a snake's hideaway. The snapping and crunching drew closer, preceded by three dancing flashlight beams that crisscrossed the slender path.
He slowed his breathing, slipped the assault rifle strap from his shoulder, and clicked off the safety. Who was tramping around the rainforest at this time of night? There was only one jackpot answer. The drug smugglers.
A lone gunman appeared first. The thickly bearded man studied the path beneath the beam like a professional tracker. Jackson held his breath. His footprints would be easy to spot in the damp earth! He lowered the barrel until its lethal eye was directed at the man's chest. One trigger tug, and the man would be hamburger.
Two other men crashed clumsily through the bordering vegetation, a steel cage hoisted between them. A spotted jaguar snarled at the rough handling and swiped through the cage bars at its closest captor.
"Be careful, you idiots!" the first man hissed in Portuguese. "You'll alert the Americans, fools. Our bosses would not like that, no?"
His two gaunt accomplices nodded fearfully at the mention of their superiors.
The tracker pointed down at Jackson's fresh footprints. "See, the Americans have been down this trail recently," he said. "It's time to release our friend."
Jackson smiled. The tracker was unable to distinguish footprint direction, because his were headed toward the drug smugglers, not back to camp. The three were obviously out of their element in the jungle!
The pair lowered the cage to the ground and hesitantly removed the locking pin.
"Now?" one of the men whispered.
"Now!" the tracker answered, when he stood safely behind the cage.
They raised the cage door. The five-foot jaguar ignored the men and sprang past Jackson up the tree to freedom. The drug smugglers scanned the area again for signs of their enemies, the Americans, and then turned and backtracked along the path. Soon their slashing flashlight beams vanished.
Jackson swallowed dust. He wasn't out of the woods yet. His feline friend rested on a limb twenty feet above him, waiting for him to move from the hollow's sanctuary.
The leafy limbs prevented him from getting a clear shot at the one-hundred-and-fifty-pound cat with the rifle. He swore under his breath. If he sprayed the tree limb with a Hail Mary volley, the three smugglers would return quickly. He didn't like those odds. Not one bit.
A wave of anxiety washed over his calm. He fought it back. The old childhood feeling never failed to reappear at the worst times. Perspiration saturated his face, and he brushed it away. He waited impatiently for the sensation to pass. Time ticked away inside his head like an ominous countdown. Soon the jaguar would make its move, and he had to be ready for the confrontation. Completely focused. Composed.
The predator leaped down from limb to limb until it was crouched above its prey. A snarl rippled its jowls. Jackson lowered his weapon and stepped out onto the path.
The jaguar's golden eyes locked on his green ones, and for a full minute the large cat did nothing. Its breathing rhythmically swelled and drained its ribcage like blacksmith bellows. It appeared to be a Mexican standoff.
Then, without warning, it leaped to the ground at its prey's feet, but Jackson didn't flinch. Didn't break his hypnotic bond with the savage creature.
Its eyes glowed like moonstones as Jackson gradually lowered the flat of his hand to the top of the jaguar's head. The coarse fur bristled beneath his touch, but still Jackson remained unaffected. Mosquitoes hummed around his face and fed at will, but his concentration remained unbroken.
A low growl quivered the cat's throat, but it didn't attack at the anomalous contact.
Jackson's mind was filled with vivid images. Several corrupt dockworkers stood talking and smoking on a nondescript river pier in daylight. A line of stacked jaguar cages rested in the shade beside the far dock. The entrances to four cavernous warehouses gaped open and revealed a procession of yellow forklifts motoring in and out like worker ants and transporting unwieldy crates to a moored river freighter.
Since the psychic vision was streamed through the big cat's brain, the men's conversation was reduced to unintelligible garble, but Jackson was skilled at reading lips. He interpreted the word Manaus and Thursday before dawn before the unkempt men concluded their banter and begrudgingly returned to work. He committed the layout of the river warehouse zone to memory.
Tomorrow was Thursday, and Manaus was a river town about five miles west of Holloway's camp. With luck, Desmond and his band of merry men could trap the smugglers in Manaus, while he, Holloway, and his FBI agents could storm the river warehouse operations.
Jackson's boosted the intensity of his gaze into the animal's mind, and finally after five tedious and tense minutes, the jaguar sank to its stomach and rolled over on its side, fast asleep. Jackson wiped the feeding insects and a sea of sweat from his face, retrieved the rifle, and jogged toward camp. He didn't have a moment to waste.
The stark camp lights bled into the darkness directly ahead. Jackson quickened his stride. There was considerable planning to coordinate in a brief amount of time. He just hoped they could pull it off.
Teddi's life depended on their success.
Twenty-eight-year-old Tori Hopewell stared out the window of her third-floor townhouse that rested on the fringe of the Everglades along Interstate 75. Her building resembled an island fortress, surrounded on all sides by water. Steaming, stinking swamp water. Thankfully, the townhouse sat above the swamp's flooded water level.
Whatever had possessed her and her boyfriend, Miguel Sanchez, to purchase the damn place? The developers promised serene country living, that's why, but those lying assholes were a little vague on the country part of their claim. Their salesman's animated spiel about country living had excluded mosquitoes, gators, some crocs, boas, and pythons, and of course, water snakes. Lots and lots of nasty snakes. She brushed her red hair from her shoulders and shivered from the many memories of strolling to her car in the early morning to discover coiled water moccasins dotting the pavement. Thick, short, and ugly serpents that were forever pissed off and ready to strike.
And now the rain. Flooding rains. Fucking monsoons! Their brand-new cars sat submerged in the rear of the townhouses under four feet of smelly, gross water, isolating their owners from the world for the past three weeks like island castaways. Their food supply was nearly exhausted, although some local jet skiers made beer, snack, and pizza runs for cash. That is, until every alligator in the world decided to abandon the swamp and pile up around the facility's perimeter fence like patties on a triple Whopper. Drool formed and leaked out a corner of her mouth. God, that triple-bypass burger sounded damn good at the moment.
Tori scanned the living room walls and felt them closing in on her and Miguel. She was feeling a lot claustrophobic after a steady diet of his company without a break. Rainy day sex had been really great for a while, but they had both grown bored with each other. Depression smothered their ecstasy. Neither felt like rising to the occasion, but they were eager to snap each other's head off at the slightest provocation. If the waters didn't recede soon, they might well become victims of a murder-suicide.
Miguel lazed on the couch like a leech on a wound, occasionally showing signs of life if his Florida Marlins won a game. Wins were in short supply this year.
Tori turned away from the rain-splattered window. "I'm going for a short walk around the building," she announced abruptly.
Miguel's black mop-topped head popped up. "Say what? Are you nuts, woman? Didn't you see the gators hanging around down there?" he reminded her.
She pointed out the window into the evening twilight. "They're outside the fucking fence where they can't get me. And besides, I can't go far. Everything's flooded around our building."
Miguel shrugged and directed his attention back to the baseball game on television. "Suit yourself, but I'd stay on the sidewalk if I were you. The ground's gotta be wet and the grass is tall. Snakes love that combination, dear."
"Thanks for the advice, Jungle Mig." Tori retreated to their bedroom, tossed her bathrobe on the unmade bed, and slipped into a brief bikini top and jogging shorts. She adjusted her ample breasts so the pink of her nipples didn't peek out from the top, and tugged on an older pair of New Balance running shoes.
She surveyed her appearance in the dresser mirror. She looked pretty damn spectacular for a claustrophobic nut job on the verge of hacking her boyfriend into little pieces. She grinned maliciously. All except one part of his anatomy. Her long red hair hung in flowing curves over her shoulders, framing her oval, freckled face. Her normally radiant hazel eyes were dulled from the tedium of isolation.
Tori marched past Miguel and slammed the townhouse door shut behind her without so much as a grunt goodbye. When she opened the steel stairwell door, the humidity wrung her lungs of air and frosted her fair skin with perspiration. She didn't mind the discomfort. She finally was free from her confinement, if only for a short while.
The ground floor door swung open easily, and Tori paused to scan the dreary landscape. Hundreds of restless alligators were stacked haphazardly against the wrought iron fence, crushing the snake fence that spanned the bottom three feet of the eight-foot fence. The builder advertised it as a means to keep their compound relatively snake-free, but like everything else he promised, it failed to validate his claims.
It ceased raining, and she was glad for the relief. Despite the presence of her new neighbors outside the fence, she threw caution to the wind and moved briskly on the wet sidewalk toward the back of the six-building complex. Parking-lot lights perched atop spindly poles cut through the misty nightfall and relieved some of her anxiety.
Primordial grunts and the swish-slapping of gator tails eroded her pluck as she paused to study the flooded parking lot. A lumpy sea of car rooftops. Tori speculated about how many insurance agents would slice their wrists over the impending claims.
Ahead, at the end of a raised walkway that resembled a narrow dike running parallel to the swamp, Tori stared wistfully at the arched footbridge. It spanned the channel connecting the swamp to the retention pond behind the parking lot and was seldom used. Except for the lake doctor's puny boat putt-putting in from the Everglades to maintain the pond-water clarity. Chain-link gates spanned the canal opening at the swamp and prevented gators from entering.
Tori loved the pond. Its serene beauty absorbed the stress of her long days of hawking timeshare properties to unreasonable people with too much money and too little appreciation for her talent. But, it was a decent living. Decent enough to allow her to purchase her overpriced townhouse in a country paradise.
Tori continued to ponder the footbridge, but her sarcasm soured her mood. Her stress level elevated a smidge. Her temples tingled at the thought of her poor choices in real estate and boyfriends. She absently massaged her forehead. She chastised herself for the negativity. After all, she came outside to alleviate her tension, not amplify it!
Her eyes roamed the fence that ran precipitously close to the elevated path leading to the footbridge. Her sanctuary. But what if the fence collapsed, sending all those gators streaming into the townhouse property? She'd be trapped on the footbridge until they climbed it and made a meal of her. Stop it, Tori!
Her anxious gaze shifted to the sidewalk surface. She estimated that it was flooded by no more than a few inches of water --- shitty, slimy-looking stuff.
Tori took a deep breath. The odds of the fence collapsing were slim to none. She bent and removed her sneakers. Her decision was made. She would walk the two hundred feet to the bridge barefooted in the gross water, and then meditate atop the arched span.
She dropped her shoes on the moist pavement, strode up the ramp that led to the elevated sidewalk, and began her nerve-wracking trek to the bridge beside the gators a mere six feet away. She carefully raised her foot with each step and planted it silently back into the water. No use calling attention to herself --- ringing their dinner bell.
Tori was just over halfway to the bridge when she spotted her first water snake, but it S-stroked away from her as if it had more important things to do than inject her with a painful dose of poison.
The footbridge stood in a puddle of black beyond the reach of the parking-lot glow. Normally, the stone structure arched majestically twelve feet above the canal, but the flooding had reduced that clearance in half. The canal gates rested forty feet to the west, and the swamp stretched into the blotted sunset.
Tori hurried the final twenty feet to the bridge and raised her fist in triumph when her foot landed on the relatively dry concrete and stone surface. After rapidly scaling the incline to the top of the arch, she leaned against the short stone wall on the pond side. She made it!
Her eyelids collapsed as the calm of her sanctuary swept over her. She attempted to shove the depression of the past three weeks from her mind. A slight breeze rustled her hair and chilled her damp skin. Her nipples rose like yeast bread against the thin fabric of her top, and she felt a welcome tinge of horniness below. She smiled. Miguel loved her nipples hard. Maybe she should have insisted that he accompany her. They could've made mad passionate whoopee on the bridge.
A sudden whooshing below the footbridge erased her sexual fantasy. She peered over the wall and watched swirling ripples disturb the canal surface. Hmm. Too large for snakes, even pythons. Probably a rogue gator that was trapped inside the pond before the rains started falling forever.
Tori looked toward the swamp and the now absolute darkness to the west. Even the gators were invisible. She heard a faint metallic thunk, and she crossed the bridge and squinted into the darkness. A vague movement caught her eye, and her heart raced. The chain-link gates were open and bumping the concrete walls flanking the canal!
Her serenity exploded like a pricked balloon. God, the place could be swarming with gators, and she was the center of attraction. Dinner on a bridge! Come and get it!
Tori fearfully scanned the pond's visible shoreline to the east where the faint glow from the parking lot cast ragged shadows. No sign of gators there, but they were good at hiding. She dropped her gaze again to the water below the footbridge. The black surface was gator-free. What was up with that? she wondered. The gators should have crowded the canal by now.
As Tori leaned over the wrought iron handrail and pondered the significance of the gator-less canal and pond, a monstrous form burst from the water. Its toothy mouth completely filled her vision and plucked her off the bridge! A scream formed in her throat, but the giant creature's mouth swiftly closed on her soft flesh and ground her struggling form to lifeless pulp within seconds.
The fifty-foot beast fell back into the canal with a cannonade splash, taking half of the stone arch and the entire handrail with it. A frothy wave washed over the remains of the bridge as the creature swam past the broken gates into the swamp. After its latest snack was forced down its throat into its stomach, the beast sped southward toward the Gulf of Mexico.
It was still ravenous.
Dex angrily kicked a leg beneath his office desk. His number one choice for a temporary deputy had up and disappeared on him! He propped his elbows on the blotter and buried his face in his calloused hands. Jesus, what else could go wrong?
Phone calls to Jackson's Louisiana house and to his FBI boss, Charlie Simmons, had yielded a big fat zero on the information scale. The psychic had seemingly vanished into thin air. However, Dex had a sneaking suspicion that Charlie hadn't come completely clean on the subject of Jackson's whereabouts, but that was to be expected.
Dex kept in touch with the hospital, too, ostensibly to monitor Teddi's progress, but he really wanted to know if Dr. George had seen or spoken with Jackson. So far, that was another dead end.
Teddi, unfortunately, was still in a deep coma. Dr. George was afraid that the longer she remained comatose, the slimmer her chances of ever awakening. Dex listened, but didn't believe a word of the doc's dire predictions. He had a thing called faith on his side, and he truly believed Teddi would wake up soon and be her old sassy self.
The phone rang, and Dex nearly leaped from his chair. A back muscle complained from the sudden awkward movement, and he jammed a fist into his lower back and plucked the receiver with his other hand.
"Sheriff Lowe," he said through clenched teeth.
"Hey, Dex, it's John Redfeather."
"Good to hear from you." He meant it. "What's up?"
"We have a lunch appointment with Professor Jilly Newton Friday at P.F. Chang's across from Florida Atlantic University."
He noted on his calendar that that was three days away. "What time?"
"Eleven-thirty. You know, to beat the lunch rush."
"Gotcha." Dex wrote down the meeting specifics on a white legal pad. "Did you send her your pictures?"
"Oh yeah. I emailed them."
"And?"
"She thought we were both full of shit."
Dex leaned back and laughed, but his back didn't. He grimaced.
John chuckled. "But after watching the displaced gator population on television and a close-up of the Lapis brothers' boat, she backed off a little and agreed to meet us for lunch," he explained.
"But she still thinks we're certifiable?"
"Oh yeah, I definitely got that impression."
"Maybe all the professor really wants is a free meal."
"I was thinking along those same lines myself, but hey, it's worth a shot."
"Amen. I'll see you Friday."
"Dex, wait!"
Dex planted the receiver back against his ear. "Yeah?"
"Have you been following the news?"
"I hate to admit it, but I have."
"Have you noticed that the rash of gator incidents and missing people and pets have progressed farther south?"
Dex pursed his lips. "I haven't really thought about it, no."
"It appears as if our prehistoric friend is heading toward the Gulf of Mexico."
Dex arched his brows. "So?"
"Once it hits the open waters, we'll have a cold chance in Hell of catching it."
Dex chuckled. "That's not exactly what I had in mind."
"What did you have in mind?"
"Take a few pictures of the thing and turn them over to the proper authorities."
"Bad idea."
"Why?"
"Any government agency would leak the information to the press, and we'd have a reckless monster hunt on our hands."
"Doesn't sound so bad to me," Dex objected.
"It sounds terrible if you consider how many fools'll die trying to capture a perfect killing machine the size of four or five Great White sharks."
"Well, now that you put it that way . . ."
"Our best bet is to track it and kill it ourselves."
"Are you crazy, John?"
"Maybe."
"Hmmm."
"What's going through that nefarious mind of yours, Dex?"
"I was just wonderin' why the creature, if that's what it really is, is leavin' our neck of woods after so many years hangin' around Demon Key?"
"I don't have a clue."
"I was also wonderin' if we could nail down why it's leavin', we might be able to coax the sucker right back here. Seems to me that it would be a lot safer for all of us to kill it in the shallows of the Everglades."
"That's a lot of wondering, Dex."
"I suppose."
"See you Friday."
"Right." Dex replaced the receiver and glanced through the office door window where Wilkerson and his band of idiots were huddled. Why couldn't Wilkerson go get himself lost like Jackson? He shook his head slowly. He really disliked that pain-in-the-ass Wilkerson, and he didn't trust the agent much, either. Dex just couldn't put his finger on precisely why.
But he would keep trying --- real hard.
After Jackson returned to the DEA base of operations, he disclosed the details of his brief jungle encounter to an incredulous group. Everyone but Demmy was skeptical.
"The white medicine man speaks true," he insisted in his native tongue. Desmond interpreted the chief's statements. "There is such a place. I have seen it upriver from Manaus. Many men. Evil men. Big boats come and go, taking big boxes with them."
"Can you locate the place on the map?"
He nodded curtly. "Of course I can."
Desmond unrolled a map of the region on the table and pointed out their current position, and then they all stared at the old man's crooked finger as it traced the blue line of the Amazon River up to a point on the Negro River where the Branco River joined it.
"There," he said. "Two days' journey."
Desmond clapped his hands and straightened. "Not if we use fast boats."
"River currents treacherous," the chief informed him in his native tongue. "There is another river north of Manaus that is not on your map. The currents are lazy, and many trees cover parts of it like a green sky. Beware, though, of monkeys and snakes that will rain down on your boat from those trees. Very bad medicine."
Jeff Malloy smiled. "We'll let the DEA take the river route while we close in on whatever's going down in Manaus before dawn."
Demmy jabbed a finger into his own ribs. "We go. I no trust DEA. Only FBI."
Malloy's smile collapsed. "DEA agents are very friendly," he argued.
Demmy turned in his chair and spat on the floor.
"Did I understand Demmy's gestures correctly?" Jackson asked Desmond. "Did he state that he was going, too?"
Desmond posed Jackson's question to the chief.
"We go with FBI. Show you the way," he said, puffing out his chest. "You be safe with us."
"Great!" Jackson nearly shouted. "Let's ready those boats and get started."
"Whoa," Holloway snapped. "This kind of trip requires planning."
Jackson stood over the agent. "We'll plan on the way. Now where are those damn boats?"
While the others abandoned the pre-fab structure to prepare for the mission, Jackson used the solitude to phone of a friend of his at the US State Department in Washington. After a few minutes of catching up on old times, Jackson asked his contact if he would check all the immigration records for the name Swinson, especially those from Brazil. His friend agreed to help, but it would take him several days to get to it because of his current workload. Jackson thanked him, suggested that they get together soon in the bayou for some fishing, and hung up.
He leaned back in his chair and stared absently into space. Could it be possible that another Swinson was the one responsible for Teddi's coma? Only time would tell.
Before boarding, Jackson pulled Demmy aside and withdrew the vial containing Teddi's blood from his pocket.
"Check this for me and see if a spell's been cast on it," he instructed the chief, a sharp edge to his voice.
Demmy hunched his shoulders to communicate that he didn't understand English. Jackson leaned in close to his face.
"Cut the crap, chief! You understand English --- I've read your thoughts," he hissed, so the others couldn't hear.
Demmy glowered at the white magic man and held out his hand grudgingly. "Give me blood." He twisted the cap from the glass vial and dipped his long, ragged, and stained fingernail into the red liquid. He painted the tip of his tongue and immediately spat it onto the dirt at his feet. "Bad blood. What you call voodoo blood. This person under another's spell. An evil witch doctor," he grunted softly in English.
Jackson screwed the cap back on the vial and tucked it into his pocket. "Well, can you help me save her from that witch doctor?"
Demmy grinned. "Have jungle plant that will chase evil spirit from your dear friend's body. But only Yokie knows where it can be found."
Jackson nodded and noticed the east horizon lightening. "Good. He and I'll fetch some of that miracle plant of yours today as soon as we take care of the smugglers."
Demmy grunted his affirmation and joined the others on the short dock, where a small group of FBI agents was busily piling weapons and ammunition in the boat's cabin beneath the glow of a pair of floodlights. Jackson watched Demmy go, and scratched his scruffy chin. Suddenly, his arms prickled as his psychic senses perceived some nebulous change in the chief, but it was nothing concrete. He would keep a close eye on Demmy during the trip.
Before Jackson could ponder his surprising perception about Demmy, they were cruising the river. The black water reminded Jackson of his beloved bayou beneath dawn's first gray radiance. After a few miles, a dense, smoky mist hid the river's surface, except in several grassy coves carved into its banks. Long, broad tree leaves drooped above them like dozing bats in a dank cavern, dripping so much water that the travelers were soaked to the skin within minutes. The smothering atmosphere made it difficult for the Americans to draw a breath, but it didn't hamper the Indians' breathing. Both drew in smoke from their pipes and easily blew it out as if the morning was cool and dry.
The prow spotlights scanned the impenetrable gloom, but failed to uncover obstacles or other dangers in the water that could damage the boat. The twenty-six-foot fiberglass cruiser drew very little water and was powered by a four hundred horsepower diesel engine. The two natives seemed totally relaxed as they peered into the profuse mist, and Jackson wondered if they might possess some sort of supernatural vision.
Animal wails and haunting screams sent shivers through the anxious Americans.
"You sure this is the way?" Desmond questioned the chief.
The contents of Demmy's pipe glowed an eerie orange-red, spewing erratic plumes of spiraling smoke. "This the way. You see."
Holloway was briefly taken aback by the man's response in English, then recovered by clearing a bullfrog from his throat. "I'm still not convinced that there are enough of us to make a huge bust like this."
"The chief says six is enough, and I trust his judgment," Jackson responded. "Have a little faith, Art."
"We've been after these bastards for years, Jackson. I sure as hell don't want to be the one facing a hostile Senate hearing committee back home and telling them that we went into the fight understaffed and fuckin' blew it," Holloway growled.
"I think we shoulda let the DEA and the Brazilian troops handle this end of the bust, while we conducted the cakewalk in Manaus," Desmond grumbled.
Jackson lit a cigar as Malloy muttered something gruffly under his breath and looked away. Desmond kept his eyes ahead as the bow sliced through the still and foreboding white mist.
"Didn't know you smoked," Holloway sniped.
"Only when people get on my nerves."
Demmy stood abruptly. "Get the weapons ready. Low trees coming up soon."
Ten minutes later, the jungle went dead silent. No animal, bird, or insect sounds. No river gurgling. Nothing but the blood pulsing through their ears.
The mist thinned, revealing grayish-green tree canopies in the dim light. Demmy instructed them to refrain from speaking, and everyone enthusiastically complied. The native pipes were snuffed out, and Jackson's cigar lay extinguished atop the river a ways back. The bow spotlights were extinguished as well. They were going in blind.
Desmond's tremulous hand maintained light pressure on the throttle, keeping the engine humming quietly, but he yearned to slap the lever forward and get the hell through there as fast as possible. Their relative crawl along the river was maddening. He felt like a target at a carnival shooting gallery. Out in the open. Gliding back and forth --- grinning like a suicidal idiot. Waiting to be shot down. Watching the dimwitted carnie give his murderer a choice of stuffed animals. What a kick . . . to buy the farm like a sitting duck.
Jackson was uneasy as well. Unseen enemies above could drop on them like lethal paratroopers at any second. His mouth was mummy dry despite the humid conditions. He couldn't generate enough saliva to lick his lips or swallow. His wide eyes scanned the tree shadows. His stomach tightened. He sensed the danger approaching . . . waiting . . . on a collision course with the boat.
He squeezed his eyelids shut for an instant to cast off some of the paralyzing tension, and slowly drew his handgun. The others agents followed suit, while the natives slid long knives from the sheaths at their sides.
Jackson sucked in the malevolent air and exhaled sharply. All hell was about to break loose, and all he could focus on was saving Teddi's life. If he perished on this godforsaken river now or bought it fighting the drug smugglers later, nobody'd be left to deliver Yokie's supernatural antidote.
The psychic's resolve strengthened as pink daylight diffused the gray cloak. A lopsided smile dissolved his anxiety and creased his sweat-slick face. Bring on the monkeys and snakes and anything else in the rainforest arsenal. His hand tightened around his gun.
It was a good day for killing.
Dex strode into Teddi's hospital room, propped his dripping umbrella behind the door, and advanced toward his inert friend. Rain dollops smacked the window behind the bed, and angry thunderclaps rattled his teeth as he pulled the lone plastic chair beside the bed rail and sat down. His lower back muscles complained, but he overruled them.
"Evening, sunshine," he whispered.
Teddi stared straight up at the ceiling as she had since her admission, and her complexion remained sallow wax. Dex fought back a teary emotional rush and a sudden urge to retreat from the room, but a stream of tears dampened his cheeks before that decision was fully contemplated. He tugged a wrinkled white handkerchief from his rear jeans pocket, wiped his face, and blew his nose with a single honk.
He cleared his throat. "I haven't told you about my little swamp adventure with John Redfeather," he began. Twenty minutes later, he finished relating their discovery.
"So, Friday we meet up with a snooty professor from Florida Atlantic who scoffed at our findings and conclusions earlier, but now wants to discuss our theories. I think what the cynical broad really wants is a free lunch." He grinned. "Sorry about the broad crack, but it's the first thing that came to mind. Her name's Jilly Newton. Doctor Jilly Newton."
The nurse came in, frowned at Dex, and rapidly noted the latest readings on the myriad of readouts across the room. He remained silent during her stay, and soon she hummed an unfamiliar tune and disappeared into the corridor.
Dex stood, bent over Teddi, and kissed her cool forehead. "Well, I best be goin'. That ex-hubby of yours is plannin' to tear up Demon Key with his FBI crime scene buddies, and I'd better keep an eye on him." He paused. "I could sure use some help, Teddi. I hope you break outta this coma and join up with me real soon." He sniffed, retrieved his damp umbrella, and walked somberly from the room.
Deep within the misty Louisiana Bayou, a roaring bonfire crackled and snapped, casting demon silhouettes upon a robed figure kneeling at the edge of the flames. The twilight air was dead still as the curling smoke rose through the moss-laden trees toward the dreary sky. Absolute silence surrounded the fire and the figure. No bird calls. No animal rustlings. No gator splashing. It was as if the snaking flames had cast a spell upon the entire bayou.
The figure's chanting was barely audible above the clamorous blaze. A menacing stone ring circled the site, each flat surface depicting a horrible demonic form. As the lone figure raised his voice and arms, the yellow-orange flames were magically transformed to a deep purple, then jet black. The smoke ceased rising and hung motionless in the air like a black shroud above the circle. The fire quieted, and the figure's male voice, deep and frantic, sliced the ominous silence like a dagger blade. A sudden wind emanated from the robed man and swirled swiftly around inside of the circle. The fire's flames danced and curled from the invisible force, fighting for survival.
The curious tornado died as quickly as it had begun. The flames now formed a twenty-foot fiery sculpture that flickered in and out of reality. Horns sprang from its grotesque head, and curved spikes protruded from its nebulous, crooked spine. A grating, unearthly voice rumbled from its depths in an ancient language, long forgotten except by those proficient in the most powerful black arts.
The man replied calmly but commandingly, and the frozen flames spoke again. A red energy bolt sizzled and cracked as it split the air and struck the man. He didn't move. Again, an energy bolt pummeled the robed figure, but he remained inert.
Suddenly, the flaming spirit vanished, leaving behind a smoking jumble of scorched logs resembling Cajun black bones. The man stood, a red halo enveloping his frame. He tugged the hood over his head and retreated from the bayou, his face hidden in its shadows.
Dex had found his office empty and decided to pay Demon Key a visit. Before he was halfway there in his fishing boat, he noted the dusky western horizon lit up like the Fourth of July. He quickly moored his boat, flashed the FBI agent guarding the dock his sheriff's identification, and sloshed up the path toward the house.
Dex shivered as sheets of wind-propelled rain pummeled his face and legs, left unprotected by his orange slicker. It was then that he recalled the rampaging Everglades creature that had eaten Morris and Munro Lapis not far from the key. He swore. He was a fool to have made this trip in such a small boat, where he was as inviting as a sardine in an open tin can.
Oh well, he thought, what's done is done. Wouldn't be the first time he'd done something so damn stupid. But at least this time, he kinda regretted it.
He searched the area. Now where in blazes was that other damn fool, Wilkerson? Both the house and the pole barn out back appeared deserted beneath the intense daylight cast from several banks of generator-powered floodlights. Damn that Wilkerson! Leave it to him to find a place for his entire team of investigators to hide in all this frigging light.
A sudden shout surfed a gust and disrupted his daze; it came from the far side of the key. The cemetery!
Dex leaned into the gusting squall and picked up his pace. He struggled up the slick slope behind the pole barn and peered into the torrential downpour. A dozen or more agents with flashlights scrambled up the cemetery hill toward the old stone mausoleum. They resembled maggots on a dead man's ass. Dex chuckled at the thought. Maybe he'd repeat it to Wilkerson for the helluva it.
An indistinct shape filled the lighted mausoleum doorway, and he waved his arms furiously at the others to hurry. Must be Wilkerson, Dex figured. The sheriff sighed. He sure as hell didn't want to miss the arrogant special agent's big show, so he pulled his slicker tight to his body and ran and slid down the slope and up the gravestone-littered hillock like a slapstick clown.
The others were safely inside by the time Dex reached the mausoleum's threshold. He leaned heavily against the wood beam doorframe, turned his back to the storm, and gasped for breath. He was definitely too friggin' old to be at the beck and call of his inexorable curiosity.
After a few minutes of recharging, Dex regained a semblance of physical composure and stepped inside. Instead of joining a crowd of FBI agents, he found himself alone. He massaged his soggy chin, bewildered.
Now where in the Sam Hill had everyone got to?
Jackson and his edgy companions didn't have long to wait.
A bizarre din, not unlike a cheering throng at an NFL football game, descended upon them, and although the men realized that there was no stadium in the rainforest, it did nothing to allay their escalating apprehension. The misty horizon blackened behind them as skeleton branches scraped the bow cabin like bony fingers. The men swiveled their heads swiftly in both directions, their senses acutely attuned to danger.
The wild cheering faded to monstrous fluttering, and before any of them could squeeze off a single burst from their automatic weapons, thousands of bats were upon them! Teeth, leathery wings, and claws filled the men's wide-eyed visages as they fought to protect their eyes from the lethal onslaught of the repulsive, blood-starved creatures. The natives swung their long knives in quick angled slashes above their foreheads, chopping bats faster than experienced chefs could mince benign onions on a cutting board.
Hostile, toothy mouths, beady black eyes, and ominous, hissing mouths loomed above the boat rails. Long, mottled, sinewy bodies followed and violently rocked the boat.
"Inside the cabin!" Holloway screamed, his panicked countenance concealed beneath a bloody veil.
Demmy and Yokie remained outside the cabin door and kept the bats from invading the open threshold as the men scrambled into the cabin. A dozen or more anacondas slithered over the deck rails and closed in on the natives. Without breaking his slashing rhythm, the medicine man lowered his strokes in time to decapitate the closest anaconda. When the agents were all safely inside the cabin, the natives slipped inside like wraiths and slammed the door shut on the swarming bats. Several of the furry creatures crashed to the deck, either stunned or dead.
Jackson peered out the portals in time to witness a storm of screeching monkeys raining down from the tangled canopy onto the beleaguered boat. Their nails clicked across the cabin top like deafening hail. The dazed and bloodied FBI agents huddled in the starboard corner with their rifles held stiffly before them like the last defenders of the Alamo, and in their dazed state, they were oblivious to their torn clothing and the severity of their hemorrhaging wounds. The natives stood stoically in the opposite corner, concerned but calm. Too calm, Jackson reasoned.
Three of the attacking anacondas encircled the cabin, searching for a way to reach their prey. Suddenly, the port cabin wall creaked and groaned. The agents' frightened gazes shot to the stressed wall. Desmond appeared ready to fire a fusillade of bullets through the fiberglass.
Holloway waved his hand in front of Desmond's crazed stare, and the agent slowly lowered his rifle barrel.
"Don't," Holloway ordered brusquely. "You'll blow out that wall so that the damn monkeys and anacondas can join us in here!"
The hysterical special agent was near tears. "I'm . . . I'm sick of this, Holloway! I can't stand being trapped like rats in here." Perspiration drenched his forehead. "I've got to get out of here . . . now!" Desmond's arms shook as he raised his rifle again, but a silhouette appeared behind him and brought a handgun butt down hard on the back of the special agent's head.
Desmond slumped forward, and Holloway caught him and his falling rifle.
Holloway nodded to Jackson. "Thanks. We were almost goners there for a second."
"We're not out of the woods yet."
"Don't you mean rainforest?" Malloy added with a feeble grin, a halfhearted attempt at humor.
Jackson lightly patted Malloy's shoulder. "Now don't you go off the deep end on us," he warned.
"I won't."
"What are we going to do, LaFevre?" Holloway whispered. "Got any bright ideas?" He wedged Desmond's limp form into the corner behind them.
"Give me a minute to figure out what's happening out there," Jackson replied thoughtfully.
"Wait? Figure out what's happening?" Holloway's blood pressure spiked. "What's happening is that we're stuck out here in the middle of nowhere with exactly zero prospects of being rescued!"
"Have you tried radioing the base for help?"
Holloway's face froze. "Uh, no," he said sheepishly. "I'll try it now."
Jackson poked his face close to the grimy door window and hastily jumped back when a monkey leaped against the glass, its fangs bared and eyes ablaze. Jackson frowned. The monkey's wildly hostile features reminded him of rabid animals he'd come across in the Bayou, except there was no foaming at the mouth. But that was impossible, wasn't it? An entire jungle filled with rabid monkeys? Not a chance, and yet their violent actions appeared unnatural. Maybe supernatural.
The bats had promptly retreated when the monkeys arrived, and Jackson had no clue why. Perhaps the two species were mortal enemies, but securing that knowledge wouldn't help them escape their current predicament. He kneaded the burgeoning pain in his temples. Like he had observed earlier, before they'd launched the boat, something was dreadfully wrong about this entire scenario, but what the hell was it? The more he strained his brain, the more elusive the answer became.
Suddenly, an even stranger spectacle materialized outside, if that was possible. He moved close to the window again and watched a white-whiskered spider monkey race across the stern deck with the boat's antenna in tow. Jackson turned to Holloway, who was desperately trying to raise someone back at the base camp on the radio.
"You can forget the radio," Jackson announced in a low voice.
Panic glazed Holloway's eyes. "What do you mean?" His tone sounded a lot like a condemned man on death row.
Jackson quickly answered.
Holloway shook his head slowly. "We're doomed, man. We're fucking doomed!"
The skittering ceased atop the cabin, but it was quickly replaced by furious scratching.
"What the hell . . ." Malloy murmured, glancing up.
"Now what?" Holloway asked no one in particular.
"It sounds like our damn monkey friends are trying to dig their way inside," Malloy speculated.
Holloway swallowed. "At that pace, it won't take 'em long to breach the fiberglass."
Jackson listened with growing dread. Malloy was right. The psychic turned to the natives to find out if they had any clever ideas of how to escape their predicament, and his jaw dropped.
The digging monkeys were forgotten for the moment.
Demmy had vanished.
"Where'd Demmy go?" Jackson hollered at the agents.
Holloway and Malloy glanced vacantly toward Yokie and merely shrugged. Jackson approached the Indian, who didn't understand English.
"Malloy, ask him where Demmy went," Jackson directed.
Yokie glanced past Jackson and pointed at the small head.
"He's in the can," Malloy answered curtly. "Something wrong with that?"
Everything, Jackson thought, but he didn't have time for lengthy explanations. His gaze drifted up as a monkey clawed the first small hole in the ceiling. Fiberglas dust fell like snow to the teak floor. He quickly wedged his semiautomatic Colt barrel into the opening and squeezed off a few shots. There was an instantaneous shrieking uproar as the attacking monkeys abandoned their dead allies on the cabin roof.
Jackson pivoted. "That'll buy us some time," he proclaimed, then rushed to the closed head door. "Demmy, are you in there?" he called. He knew damn well the chief was, but a pleasant approach was less threatening than breaking down the door.
The only response was a deep, rolling rumble that shook the entire boat down to its beam. Jackson warily stepped back. What the hell was happening in there?
The wall creaked again behind the huddled agents, followed by a resonant craaack. A pair of jagged fracture lines appeared in the polished fiberglass beneath the portal. Malloy and Holloway leaped aside and exchanged frightened looks. The anacondas were still at work outside.
"I'll get Demmy out of there," Malloy volunteered, anxious to get as far away from the weakened wall as possible.
Jackson held out his hand. "Stay back."
"Listen, Psycho Man, I'll . . ."
Malloy didn't get to finish. The head door exploded outward into the cabin, nearly missing Jackson. Tendrils of grayish-black fog drifted from the opening, followed by Demmy, or something that resembled the native chief. Demmy's face was blistered black and oozed yellow pus from numerous open sores. His flat nose was now a bulbous lump with nostrils like cavernous, shadowy wells. But it was his eyes that both mesmerized and alarmed the cabin occupants. Dancing yellow and crimson flames filled his orbs as if there was a conflagration blazing inside his skull.
Demmy strode forward and ominously panned the cramped area, pausing on Malloy and Holloway. His lips parted, revealing a picket fence of razor black daggers, as his right arm pointed in their direction. His fingertips morphed into writhing piebald vipers; their hideous mouths opened, exposing baleful pairs of venomous fangs.
One of the vipers struck at Holloway, narrowly missing his shoulder.
"Jesus, you see that?" he screamed. "That finger snake grew five feet for that strike!"
Jackson had seen enough. He'd been on the money when he'd sensed a change in Demmy after their earlier conversation, but now he recognized the Indian's personality shift. The malignant force inhabiting Teddi's blood sample had rapidly consumed the chief's identity after he merely tasted it. He didn't immediately lapse into a coma like Teddi, but someone was now controlling Demmy's conscious actions. But who?
While the chief was occupied with the two agents, Jackson poked his gun barrel into Demmy's temple and pulled the trigger. Demmy ducked with inhuman speed, dodging the bullet. It harmlessly punctured the cracked fiberglass wall and whizzed by one of Holloway's ears.
Demmy's movements were a blur. He shoved Jackson so hard that he literally flew across the cabin and crashed into the far wall. His head bounced against the fiberglass, and he momentarily blacked out. When he recovered, Demmy leaned over him, his writhing finger vipers a foot from his face. Jackson froze. He was trapped! He stared into the malevolent, flaming eyes and searched for some trace of Demmy, but the monster inside had totally consumed the chief.
Before unleashing his poisonous snakes on his helpless victim, Demmy spoke strangely. "You and your damn pooch are history, pal." He grinned broadly, stepped backward, and commanded his snakes to strike. All five serpents lengthened and coiled. Jackson searched for a weapon or means to escape, but he found nothing. He was doomed. Teddi would perish because his psychic senses had failed him, as they once had in his youth.
He glared at his adversary; he was going to die like a man. He sat there, waiting stoically for the venomous fangs to penetrate his flesh and inject their lethal poison.
After several seconds passed without a strike, he broke eye contact and tentatively searched for the finger snakes. Demmy's possessed hand lay on the floor, severed from his arm; gnarled fingers slowly displaced the venomous digits. The chief glanced first at his bleeding arm, and then at his medicine man, Yokie, who stood beside him clutching a crimson-stained long knife. Yokie's expression remained placid as he poised the knife for another blow. With a swift movement, the medicine man swiped at his chief's neck, the blade cleanly separating Demmy's neck and spinal cord. Jackson watched the head tumble to the floor with relief and revulsion.
Malloy shouted something at Jackson, but the stunned psychic couldn't quite grasp the meaning. His nerves were shot and his mind in a daze. The Indian medicine man had just saved his hide --- that much registered. Holloway's unintelligible shouts mingled with Malloy's, but Jackson was totally focused on the proffered hand that helped him to his feet. It was Yokie to the rescue, again.
It took another few minutes for Jackson's mental cobwebs to clear before he comprehended the agents' shouts. The monkeys and anacondas are gone. It dawned on Jackson that Demmy's controller had conjured a spell through Demmy to initiate the attack from the rainforest creatures, and now that the controller's medium was dead, the spell was broken and the creatures returned to their normal existence. Holloway flung open the cabin door, and the fresh jungle breezes diluted death's fetid stench.
Yokie lugged Demmy's body, withered hand, and decapitated head outside and unceremoniously dumped them in the river's black current. He muttered something in his native tongue as he watched the river carry the chief's remains downstream. Malloy translated it.
"Evil life forms receive no tribal funeral. Goodbye, my old friend. May the gods purge the evil presence from your soul."
Yokie spun around and addressed Jackson. Jackson looked at Malloy for help.
"He says that he will guide you to the flowering tree that will cleanse the evil from your friend. He is no longer . . . uh, interested in confronting the smugglers."
"To be frank, neither am I," Jackson said. "I've just about had enough of this jungle life."
Holloway managed a tenuous grin. "No shit."
Yokie spoke again, and Malloy translated. "Jackson and I go alone. I will guide him safely back to your camp before nightfall. You take boat back to dock and meet us there."
Desmond groaned inside the cabin and gingerly massaged the throbbing lump on the back of his head. "What'd I miss?" he asked, standing.
"We'll fill you in on the way back to camp," Holloway replied brusquely, annoyed by his associate's hysteria under fire. "See you later, Jackson . . . and good luck."
A twinge of foreboding nagged Jackson as he kept up with Yokie's fast pace through the thick tangle of alien foliage. Deeper and deeper into the shadowy tropical forest they ventured, and although Jackson liked hiking through his beloved bayou, he was uneasy about tramping through the world's most dangerous jungle with a mysterious savage who didn't even speak English. He always considered himself fairly courageous in dire situations, but a disquieting angst plagued him nevertheless.
The medicine man effortlessly sliced a slender path through the gloom, where sunlight rarely penetrated the dense green canopy overhead. Birdcalls, high-pitched whines, screeches, cries, and rustlings enveloped them, but Yokie appeared right at home in the perilous wilderness. The tree-blotted landscape towered above them like skyscrapers lining Wall Street, filtering brilliant sunlight to twilight. The trek seemed paradoxical to Jackson --- so many stimuli assailed his finely tuned senses, and yet his anxiety gradually yielded to a deeper calm than he had ever achieved in his beloved bayou.
After four strenuous hours of brisk hiking, Jackson was drenched with sweat. His lungs and muscles ached from the relentless exertion. At last, they broke free of the jungle and stood in a dusky, round clearing. Jackson guessed it to be a hundred yards in diameter --- a circular football field. He leaned against a ominous strangler tree that had enveloped and leeched the life from another tree, sapping all the nutrients. A crooked, decayed hulk stood in the center of the predator, lifeless and broken. He was disturbed by the predatory nature of the strangler tree, and wondered how many other such plants existed in the world. Cannibalism wasn't limited to the barbaric behavior of mankind.
He peered through the grimy haze and gawked at the colossal tree growing in the center of the clearing. The magnificent citadel was at least two hundred feet tall and as big around as a California sequoia. Its ponderous limbs and branches didn't begin until halfway up the trunk. Below that boundary, large white red-tipped flowers, nearly ten times the size of jungle orchids, smothered the craggy black bark. Yokie pointed at the tree and gestured at his companion to stay put.
The medicine man disappeared behind a stand of thorny undergrowth and soon reappeared clutching a weathered wooden shield that completely screened his entire frame. After another animated warning, Yokie steadily advanced toward the beautiful tree. Jackson watched as Yokie cautiously crept across the clearing. Why was Yokie being so damn cautious? How dangerous could it be to pick a few flowers off a tree?
Jackson quickly discovered the reason. Thorns, the size of six-foot spears, shot out from the tree's trunk and struck Yokie's shield! The medicine man continued unabated as Jackson shuffled forward into the haze for a better view of the ancient tree. After three more lethal thorns stuck in Yokie's shield, Jackson spied a myriad of holes in the bark akin to camouflaged gun barrels. Jackson whistled. This forest was amazing.
Jackson ducked suddenly as a spear whistled past his face. Yokie turned and waved angrily to his companion to retreat to safety. Jackson didn't argue.
From a safe distance, he tensed as Yokie approached the hostile tree. The closer the fearless medicine man got to the tree, the harder the spear-like thorns impacted the shield. Several nearly penetrated its rock-hard veneer.
Jackson unconsciously held his breath when Yokie reached the tree, stretched his arm beyond the shield's protection, and picked eight blooms. Jackson wondered why the tree didn't attack Yokie's vulnerable arm. Because of their communication rift, he would never know.
Yokie backtracked with the shield positioned between him and the tree, and pressed the blossoms tightly to his chest. A few bees scouted the fresh flowers, but then moved on. Finally, Yokie reached safety and dumped the blooms into Jackson's arms. He returned the shield to its hiding place and rejoined Jackson.
They skirted the hazardous clearing and continued their trek into the endless jungle beyond. The gloom deepened on the rainforest floor, and Yokie quickened his already brisk pace. Jackson dug deeply within himself and somehow found the endurance to keep up.
Two hours later, the DEA campsite communication towers slid into view. Yokie grabbed Jackson's arm and motioned for him to sit. Jackson didn't argue, thankful for the rest. The medicine man built a small fire, hollowed out a short length of a fallen branch, placed the flowers on a flat rock, and crushed them with the blunt end of his knife handle. Jackson was amazed how easily the flowers dissolved to a white snow. After Yokie poured the fine flakes into the woody tube, he held it above the fire. The flakes rapidly congealed to a clear waxy substance; Yokie removed the branch from the heat, and when the antidote cooled, the native shook it out of the branch and rolled it into a tight ball. He presented it to Jackson and motioned to the area beneath his own tongue.
Jackson mimicked the action. "You place the antidote under Teddi's tongue like this, and she's cured. Right?" he questioned, as if the native could understand him.
Yokie regarded him strangely, and then broke into a wide smile. "Yeah, man."
Jackson gasped, and then chuckled. "Well, I'll be damned. After all our time together, I wonder why I never sensed that you spoke English."
"Me think only in my language. I not trust white man . . . until you. You okay."
Jackson studied the medicinal ball in his palm.
"No use all magic on your friend," Yokie warned, gesturing at the waxy wad.
The psychic frowned. "You mean you want me to save some of it?"
Yokie nodded vehemently.
"Why?"
"You will know when time comes."
Jackson hoped he would. He stood and mopped the perspiration from his face with his shirtsleeve. "Thanks for the medicine and the advice. I guess I'll be heading back to camp now. Good luck, friend."
Yokie shook his head curtly. "No. You come with me. Camp no more."
Jackson quickly gazed at the towering metal atrocities blighting the rainforest skyline. "What do you mean? The camp's right over there," he insisted.
Yokie stroked his bronze chin as if searching for the right term. "Am . . .bush." He spread both arms wide. "All dead."
Jackson dropped Teddi's cure into a vial, sealed it with a few twists, and stuffed it into his pant's pocket. He reached for his gun, but Yokie placed his hand atop Jackson's.
"Not necessary. Bad drug men gone. We go to river and wait for Holloway's boat," he said simply, and strode through the tall grass and reeds toward the river.
Jackson started after Yokie, but suddenly he cried out and crumpled to the ground as a severe pain wracked his skull. The sunlight withered to night, which was rapidly supplanted by horrific visions. Violent, shocking images. Despite his agony, he endeavored to will them away, but they lingered, projecting horror after horror in his conscious mind.
Eventually, Yokie's insistent shaking halted the appalling revelations. Jackson blinked back to reality, and the acute pain abated.
"You see things," Yokie said. It wasn't a question.
"Terrible things," Jackson nodded, as tears dribbled down his cheeks.
"I see, too. Much death."
Jackson stared at Yokie through teary eyes, wondering how the medicine man managed to tap into his private psychic pipeline. "How . . ."
"I no know," the native replied quickly --- too quickly. Jackson didn't quite believe Yokie's professed ignorance. "I no understand," he claimed, and pointed at the lump in his companion's pocket. "Medicine for woman in dream?"
"Yes."
"Then you better hurry back to white man's world before too late."
Jackson bit his trembling lip. "That's the understatement of the century."
The sooty clouds deepened at dusk, filling the corners of Teddi's hospital room with raven shadows. The lighted monitors appeared brighter by contrast and cast a faint claret glow on her fixed expression. Thunder boomed in the distance, shivering the lone window casing. The room was deathly still between thunderclaps, like one of Poe's infamous underground catacombs.
In the hall outside her room, the assigned FBI agent dozed on and off in a well-worn chair that sagged beneath his meager weight. Agent Lance Robinson had spent last night with his mistress, Kerise, and sleeping was definitely not an option at her place. Although he considered himself to be in decent shape, his hamstrings were now crampy and his lower back ached like he'd carried a piano up four flights of stairs. He felt like a stallion that had been rode hard and put away wet, and babysitting Teddi McCoy in that damn broken-down chair wasn't helping relieve his agony. Thank God, when he went home to his wife after his shift, he could catch some therapeutic winks. Her thighs were harder to pry apart these days than a pair of elevator doors with arthritic hands.
Inside the room, lightning severed the imposing gloom, and suddenly Teddi's eyes blinked several times. Her forehead crinkled, her tongue wet her parched lips, and her pupils drifted toward the IV attached to the back of her left hand. Her eyelids collapsed, and then slowly reopened. Her green pupils were now dancing yellow and crimson flames.
She sat rigidly upright in the bed with considerable effort, yanked the IV tubing from her hand, and plucked the taped monitor attachments from her skin. Frantic beeps and keening alarms splintered the ghostly stillness. Wide-eyed, Teddi slid from the bed, tested her weak knees, and limped across the small expanse to a position behind the door. The ill-fitting hospital gown slid off her shoulder, and she savagely ripped the annoying article from her body and tossed it onto the bed covers.
Agent Robinson heard the cacophony of alarms inside McCoy's room, and he reacted swiftly. He leaped from his chair, and ignoring the stabbing pains in his lower back, he pushed against the door and entered. In his eagerness, he left his gun holstered.
McCoy's bed was empty! Holding the door open, the agent fretfully glanced around the room. The alarms continued to sound, and the blinking lights looked like they were about to blow a fuse. But there was no sign of Teddi! How could that be? He had been on watch outside her door the entire evening!
The assertive voices inside Teddi's mind melded into a single spokesman --- one that was not her own. She was faintly aware that she was no longer in control of her thoughts and actions, and instead she was relegated to a helpless spectator's view from the cheap seats. She watched her hands slam the door hard into Lance Robinson, sending him crashing against the doorframe. Before he could recover, she grasped his neck and chin from behind in a vise grip, and twisted. The crisp snap of his neck sickened her, and she rapidly released his limp form. Footsteps pounded in the hallway.
Teddi pivoted and sent the heel of her hand into the incredulous nurse's nose as she entered. Her nose splintered immediately, and the fragments exploded into her brain. The woman's dead body thumped to the floor, her shocked expression disappearing beneath a torrent of blood.
Teddi dragged her body inside and closed the door. She scrubbed the sticky blood from her hands and dressed quickly. There was much to complete before morning. She gazed down at her victims without remorse. Anyone else who got in her way would receive the same treatment. Her mission was vital to the success of an ancient ritual.
She cracked the door and checked the hallway in both directions. The passageway to the emergency stairwell was clear. Without contemplating her risk of discovery, Teddi strode briskly to the stairwell and descended the four flights to the ground floor. She ignored the rain and located the car she had been instructed to find in the visitor's parking area. The keys were stuffed under the visor. She twisted the ignition key and drove slowly from the lot, not wishing to attract any attention.
Three more people were destined to die tomorrow, Friday, and one of them was a friend. But again, there was no regret. Only ruthless determination.
The kidnapper might need the women for some kind of sacrifice or ritual. If that's the case, then why now? What's so special about this time of year? Or what event has occurred to instigate the ritual?
Dex's mind revisited Teddi's queries as he stood inside the mausoleum and stared at the ladder descending into the depths below. He listened to the muffled voices of Wilkerson's FBI crime scene crew and chanced a look-see into the black opening cut in a stone rectangle that had been hidden beneath a sarcophagus-like casket. Light beams flickered like northern fireflies, but he couldn't make out one damn detail.
Frustrated, he stepped away and glanced across the creepy structure at a harness contraption that had been hidden behind a false wall. A steel arm swung out to the cut in the stone floor, and a series of well-maintained pulleys were welded to the arm. Gruesome blood splotches titivated a black leather harness attached to the ropes threading the pulleys.
Dex scowled. It didn't take a brain surgeon to figure out that Bo Swinson had used it to lower his victims into waiting jaws below. But why? And why now? Teddi's inquisitive voice resurfaced. He fervently wished that she were here with him to help shed some light on her teeth-gnashing, pain-in-the-ass questions.
He paced the rain-splashed area just inside the outer door. His memory flashed to the limestone cave that he and John had explored in the swamp. The drawing of the devastated Seminole villages and the Miccosukee Everglades creature filled his mind like a slideshow. He zeroed in on the strange-looking monster. A giant alligator with an eel tail and paddle legs and feet.
Dex stopped pacing, stood still for a short time, and then anxiously shifted his feet. Something didn't add up. Why had someone destroyed the series of cave drawings? What historical event had been portrayed on the cave wall preceding the appearance of the creature in the Seminole tribe's history? And, why had the defiler left the drawings of strange Miccosukee Everglades creature for him and John to find? He spat into the puddle at his feet. He had no idea. Maybe the FAU professor could earn her lunch and come up with one.
The distant voices below grew louder.
Dex retreated outside into the blowing rain and hid at the back of the mausoleum, while the eight FBI agents climbed up the ladder, stretched yellow crime scene tape across the doorway, and slammed the door shut. They conversed animatedly as they skirted the hillside tombstones on their way back to the pole barn.
After they cleared the far knoll, Dex ducked under the spanning tape and entered the dark mausoleum. He closed the door, plucked the flashlight from his belt, and flicked it on. The place gave him the heebie-jeebies. He almost wished that Wilkerson was here with him. Almost.
He eyed the ladder, gathered his nerve, and exhaled with a puff of his cheeks. He needed to take a look down there, and now was as good a time as any.
His stomach knotted, and chills hopscotched along his spine as he descended down the ladder into the ominous black opening. When his foot finally touched down on the floor, he quickly played his light around the tunnel. Bile scorched his throat when he glimpsed the blood-soiled floor leading into the darkness to the left. God, that damn Swinson was a real monster!
Monster.
Something killed those women down here, and although Wilkerson and his band of idiots had escaped its wrath, Dex questioned whether he would be as lucky. It was true that the monster terrorizing the Everglades had abandoned this place, but what if it returned and found its next meal walking the tunnels with a damn flashlight advertising his presence? He swallowed hard but followed the bloody trail despite his jangled nerves and the dire warnings SOSed to his pigheaded brain.
The dank air was oppressive, and the eerie shadows hovering at the fringes of his bobbing flashlight beam only heightened his trepidation. However, he was the chief of police, and if he didn't investigate every lead, then who would? Broward County Sheriff Jim "Bulldog" Stark? What a joke. That political pussyfooter probably slept with a night light on.
Dex plodded deeper into the tunnel. The silence was foreboding. Was he walking into a trap? Was the monster waiting around the next bend?
Stop it! he chastised himself. Keep your shit together and your senses on full alert. Despite his mental pleas, his sordid memory recalled the trampled wooden walkway behind his house the night of Swinson's ambush. Something big --- no, huge --- had done that. Could a big fish walk on land like that? He paused, studied the widening blood trail, and exhaled hard again. Yeah, maybe it could.
Suddenly, the shadows exploded into a sea of blackness. Dex stopped and directed his beam into the vast gloom; the panning light sliver barely reached the far side of an enormous grotto and lake. The water's surface was ice-calm and death black.
The blood trail ended at the shore's edge. Something must have dragged those women along the corridor into the lake. The big killer fish? Dex clucked his tongue, and the echo raced throughout the grotto. A single nearby splash broke the lake's placid surface into spreading concentric ripples.
Dex directed his light on the circles but saw nothing. Cold sweat blanketed his forehead. Something was out there. He sensed it now. Watching him. Sizing him up.
Dex's hand trembled as he drew his gun and clicked off the safety. If he was about to be bushwhacked, he planned to inflict a whole lotta damage on his attacker. But there were no more splashes, and he relaxed a little.
Despite his trepidation, his curiosity dictated that he explore the grotto. He glanced quickly to his right. A narrow rocky outcropping, close to twenty feet wide, separated the lakeshore and the grotto wall. Not exactly a sandy beach or a lover's lane, but it facilitated a stroll around the lake. If he wanted to.
Yeah, why not. He'd come this far. Might as well take this idiocy to the limit!
Dex surveyed the pathway in both directions and finally selected the one to his right. It wasn't exactly a scientific decision. He merely tossed a coin in his mind, and it came up heads. Go right. He grasped his gun tighter. A fool's errand.
He stared hard along his chosen path, stalling. If he procrastinated much longer, he'd wimp out, drive home, and down a few cold ones. He grinned. That sounded a helluva lot better than investigating this death lake and its spine-chilling inhabitant.
Dex sighed. He had climbed down here to find some answers, and he really shouldn't quit before he'd even looked for some. He forced his right foot forward, hoping his left wouldn't follow and he could go home. Unfortunately, it stepped forward, too.
Dex glanced wistfully at the tunnel entrance that led back to the ladder and safety above, and then, armed only with a handgun and flashlight, he headed deeper into the lair of an unknown man-eater. His weapon wouldn't amount to jack-shit if he actually encountered the large monster, but it gave him a temporary warm and fuzzy feeling to combat his burgeoning fear. Just what in tarnation was out there?
Nobody knew he was down in the grotto, and if something happened to him, the authorities wouldn't know where to search. It was a rookie mistake, but what the hell . . .
At least it wasn't raining.
Art Holloway and the FBI boat appeared near the camp just before another gray sunset. Tropical rain fell in buckets and nearly obscured the boat from view, but Yokie saw it. The Indian medicine man waved bundles of tall yellow grass like a maniac to attract Holloway's attention. The agent guided the heavily damaged craft to the bank where the two quickly climbed aboard.
Art Holloway, Sam Desmond, and Jeff Malloy looked as haggard as Jackson felt.
"Did you get the antidote for your girl in Florida?" Art asked, but his weary voice suggested that his question was merely conversational. He wasn't fishing for a long-winded answer.
Jackson patted the bulge from his pant's pocket and simply replied, "Yep." Then he told the agents that their camp had been attacked. There were no survivors.
"Did you actually witness it?" Malloy demanded.
"No. Yokie saw it . . . sort of."
"What the hell's that mean?" Desmond shot back.
"Psychic vision."
Holloway glanced at his cynical team. "Bullshit. We're going to take a look for ourselves."
Despite his fatigue, Holloway deftly docked the boat alongside the DEA dock. The three agents armed themselves with automatic weapons, bounded onto the dock with newly found energy, and disappeared up the path to the campsite. Yokie held Jackson back.
"No good. Just bodies and flies."
Jackson was suddenly suspicious. Was Yokie telling him the truth, or did he have an ulterior motive for preventing his return to the camp?
Within minutes, Art reappeared, flushed from the exertion. "It's just as Yokie described," he panted, blinking back the raindrops. "But the jeep's there, and I can take you back to that airstrip where I picked you up. The Blackhawk should be waiting."
"Can't you radio them to be sure?" Jackson asked.
"I wish. Most of the communications gear's been stolen, and what was left behind was smashed to pieces."
"Shit!"
"That's about the size of it."
"Well, I guess we'll have to chance it, Art. I've got to get back to Florida right away," he replied anxiously.
Holloway's eyes narrowed as he appraised the psychic. "Something brewing?"
"Death," he sighed. "And in bunches."
The Blackhawk was waiting at the jungle airstrip, and the pilot wasted no time flying Jackson out of that tropical hellhole. He'd had enough of the rain, heat, and bugs.
The Harrier was fueled and flight ready when the Blackhawk landed at the airbase outside of Paramaribo, Suriname. The Blackhawk pilot had radioed ahead and made the arrangements for Jackson's hasty return to Florida.
As Jackson fastened his harness inside the Harrier cockpit, his stanch veneer withered. An old familiar childhood anxiety crept into his consciousness --- one that had almost caused him to be admitted into an adolescent psych hospital at the tender age of thirteen. He grimaced behind his oxygen mask as the nearly forgotten pain rent his emotions. Tears rimmed his eyes as he recalled the tragic details.
He was only eleven when he kissed his parents goodbye at the New Orleans airport before they departed for their second honeymoon trip to Hawaii. After watching the plane ascend from the runway, he and his kindly Aunt Edith left the terminal and ambled in the warm breezes to her car parked in the short-term lot.
Suddenly, he was jolted by a psychic vision --- one that he never forgot, although a half-dozen psychiatrists did their best to help him do just that. He vividly beheld his parents' airplane spiral to a watery grave in the wide expanse of the Pacific Ocean between California and Hawaii. He cried and pleaded with his Aunt Edith to tell the airline people about the upcoming accident and have them order the plane back to New Orleans. Jackson's revelation frightened her, and she ran back into the terminal with him in tow. She swiftly explained the situation to the airline personnel at the customer service counter, but they merely repeated that they could not recall the flight on a boy's whim. But his determined Aunt Edith was not to be denied . . . until three security guards arrived and escorted her and her sobbing nephew from the terminal.
Four hours later, his aunt's phone rang, and an airline executive broke the tragic news: his parents had perished in a plane crash somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. My aunt lashed out at them with a verbal tirade that would have reduced a sailor to a quaking mass of nerves.
From that day forward, Jackson's greatest fear was that he would not be able to save those destined for death in his visions. That intense panic had nearly driven him insane. Thoughts of delicious suicide had permeated his entire mental fabric until at age thirteen, his aunt had found him in the bathroom about to slit his writs with her razor. His intense therapy had begun at that point in his adolescence.
Eight years later, after a long, passionate battle with his psychological demon, he emerged victorious. He now projected a placid, impenetrable demeanor. The shrinks had effectively built a wall around his emotions, disabling his intimate feelings. They predicted that no psychic vision, no matter how powerful, could dismantle that stout wall constructed from mental mortar and stone. They forced him to repeat it over and over and over . . . mortar and stone . . . mortar and stone . . . mortar and stone . . .
Now uneven cracks appeared in that mortar. He envisioned it. He felt it. Bit by bit, mortar chips fell away, exposing his inner beast. His unique vulnerability.
And now, Jackson's emotional resistance wilted beneath its power. His stomach clenched. Sweat leaked from his tremulous pores.
Would he return to Florida in time to save his new friends? His only friends. Or would they be lost forever like his parents?
Sheriff Stark's narrow brown eyes stared at the illuminated Everglades as it whizzed by beneath the Broward County Sheriff Department's helicopter and its searchlights. The beautiful machine was his own brainstorm, and it took him three long years of campaigning for it to become a reality. The helicopter was equipped with the latest, state-of-the-art infrared search technology, as well as radar capabilities that enabled the pilot to see through the densest fog and most tumultuous storms. As a bonus, the helicopter manufacturer threw in a couple nose-mounted portable 50mm guns at no additional charge to sink fleeing drug smuggler boats. Stark wrinkled his brow. Now they would be used to obliterate some kind of giant swamp monster.
But so far, all they'd seen were miles of beached gators. Thousands of them.
The helicopter slowly cruised south from Coral Springs toward the region where the Everglades merged with the Gulf waters. He'd been down there on a fishing trip years before and found it to be a desolate area.
As they zoomed past Alligator Alley, Deputy Gerhardt motioned at the port window. "Down there," he shouted above the noisy engine.
They peered through the rain-streaked glass at a pair of broken channel gates and a ruined bridge.
"What do you make of it, Sheriff?" Gerhardt asked.
"Don't know right offhand."
A second deputy spoke up. "Maybe our monster snatched someone off the bridge."
"Like who?" Stark retuned sharply.
The deputy shrugged. "How do I know?"
"Your imagination's working overtime," the sheriff snapped. "The monster's probably so damn big that its fin took out the bridge."
The second deputy fell back in his seat, defeated.
"You want me to put her down so we can take a look?" their young, blond daredevil pilot queried. Alex Stoner was thirty-two years old, but his fair skin and large naive eyes made him appear much younger.
"Nah, man," Stark replied. "The bastard's come and gone. We'll continue heading south, but I want everybody to keep their fucking eyes open, okay?"
The two deputies in the rear of the helicopter grunted their assent.
It swam toward the scent of unlimited food, ignoring the smaller fare along its route. Sunken logs and twisted mangroves scraped its belly and threatened to ensnare it numerous times, slowing it down. Its hunger escalated, and it became careless. It splashed noisily as it surfaced to gulp air into its lungs. The dorsal fin whipped the surface into a white froth as its elongated, sinuous tail moved in a powerful undulating locomotion like a conger eel. Its sense of hunger superseded its caution, an especially reckless trait in unfamiliar waters.
Up ahead, it suddenly sensed larger prey --- an abundance of them --- but it was moving too fast to determine whether they were enemy or dinner. Its momentum carried it forward on a collision course.
Max Lester and Darryl Chalmers had organized their hunting buddies into a Everglades monster vigilante group after they'd seen the beached gators on the television news the night before. Putting two and two together, which wasn't always easy for these trailer-park geniuses, they presumed that the killer monster was headed south --- into their neck of the woods.
Twenty-six of their closest drinking buddies answered the call to arms, and together the small armada motored out to the deepest section of the Glades at first light. The seven airboats were loaded with enough shotguns, automatic rifles, and ammunition to arm a small third-world country, not to mention a staggering amount of beer. Longneck cases were piled high in each boat as the hunters raced through the morning fog and light drizzle to their computed monster interception point an hour west into the Everglades.
Now, just before dusk, the beer supply had dwindled, along with the monster hunters' sensibility. Half were asleep in their rain slickers, while the other half were arguing or playing pissing games off the sides of the boats.
Max and Darryl, though, were wide awake and sober. They were completely dissatisfied with their friends' behavior and wished that they'd never agreed to take them along. Their original theory of "safety in numbers" had eroded to "liability in numbers."
The rain fell harder, and the tendrils of a light mist crept in from the west. Twilight was a ten-minute event; darkness fell abruptly.
Max and Darryl stiffened.
"You hear that, Max?"
"Yeah. Sounded like splashing. Big-time splashing."
"I heard it, too. You reckon our buddy's coming?"
Max listened long and hard. "Yeah, he's getting real close now. Just north of Turtle Island and headed our way like a friggin' freight train."
"You sure?"
Max didn't reply. Instead, he shouted to the champion pissers and brain-dead debaters. "Knock it off, assholes! Our monster'll be here inside of a minute!"
The debaters ended their arguments with reciprocal shoves, and the pissers fell backward into the airboats as they attempted to zip up. Some of the sodden lumps beneath the yellow and camouflage slickers roused and blinked awake, although it would be hours before their brains were fully functional.
Max and Darryl grabbed their automatic rifles, checked the clips and spare clips, and then guided their powerful spotlight into the gloom . . . back and forth over the still, rain-dimpled water north of their position.
The splashing grew louder and more violent. Max stared resolutely along the spotlight beam as Darryl scanned the other airboats for coherent activity. A few armed men stood ready for the confrontation between man and beast on the bows, some scrambled clumsily to find their weapons beneath layers of empty beer bottles in the blackness, while the others remained sound asleep.
Suddenly, Max's panicked scream rent the expectant air. "Jesus H. Christ! I can see the fucker, and it's humongous! Get goddamned ready, men!"
A fusillade of automatic rifle bullets shattered the stillness and peppered the roiling water enveloping the monster. Acrid smoke clouds mingled with the fog, reducing visibility to near zero. The badly frightened men finally ceased firing and scanned the water's surface for the creature. All was quiet. Not a splash. Not a ripple. They neither heard nor saw the monster. But they all realized that . . .
It was out there.
Dex tiptoed softly along the edge of the grotto lake, searching for more Indian drawings that might shed some light on Demon Key's monster mystery. His flashlight beam remained strong as it scanned the damp, uneven limestone walls. He kept a wary eye on the lake as he hiked, praying that the dad-blasted creature roaming its depths would stay put and leave his sorry ole ass alone. An unsettling sensation of being watched still prickled his spine and knotted his stomach. He felt like a man with a ticking time bomb in his pocket, uncertain of when it would explode.
Dex had passed the quarter mark around the lake when he nearly collided with a sizeable wall. His breath lodged in his lungs, and his knees trembled. He immediately retreated to assess the curious obstacle.
The first thing Dex noted was that it wasn't a wall at all. It was part of some kind of golden ceremonial structure that stretched from the top into the lake in progressive steps. The last step was visible beneath the shallow black water. At least it appeared to be the last step.
Dex waded into the cool water and climbed over the stepped wall at its lowest point. He guided the flashlight beam upward and nearly fell backward into the lake! A golden stairway rose up to a primitive altar cut into the grotto wall fifteen feet above him. Another stairway side, symmetrical to the one he clambered over, flanked the opposite end.
He stood there in awe, staring. He'd never been one to visit museums, because old stuff wasn't his bag, but this ceremonial temple was different. This was real to him. Something no one had seen for centuries --- maybe thousands of years. This exhibit wasn't neatly tucked into an expansive museum hall surrounded by Do Not Touch signs. And, real evil pervaded this primeval waterside temple, not just the kind described on a fancy easel placard, telling visitors exactly how evil the exhibit used to be in ancient times. He felt the malevolent spirit permeate his being and blacken his thoughts. The sensation chilled his marrow and willed him up the golden stairs toward the altar. He couldn't resist its strange and powerful sway. Desire. Command.
He was caught in a hypnotic tractor beam that drew him upward. Ever upward. He didn't fear it. For some inexplicable reason, the force fascinated him. Within seconds, he climbed atop the beautiful, yet menacing altar.
The force relaxed its sway, and Dex curiously directed his light across the altar. Enormous ancient urns lined the back edge, and upon closer inspection, Dex noticed that each one was actually fashioned from and connected to the limestone wall. Crude drawings of deformed, decapitated, and broken people adorned the upper third of each urn. Dex attempted to subdue his growing horror, but failed.
The sheriff's trembling hand guided the light higher until he gasped! Above him, an elaborately carved, grotesque sculpture rose ominously thirty feet toward the grotto's domed ceiling. The hideous figure was nestled in a colossal alcove and was completely detached from the limestone behind it. Its clawed feet rested upon a block of what appeared to be black granite.
Strange. Granite wasn't indigenous to Florida. How did that big-ass chunk of rock get there?
Dex brushed aside the annoying issue and examined the daunting fiend. Its black scaly head was shaped like a gigantic pumpkin with two pairs of browless triangular eyes forming a sinister square around two flared nostrils. The expansive bottom jaw jutted far beyond its upper lip, and four thickly curved and pointed fangs thrust up and over lesser fangs atop its cavernous mouth. No other teeth were visible.
A thorny, fin-like appendage projected from the back of its brawny neck and broadened as it continued down its backbone to the brief tail twenty feet below. A series of wide slots were sliced into its massive, gray armored chest. Dex guessed them to be gills.
Two muscular arms sprang from each side, reminiscent of multi-limbed Buddha statues that Dex had seen in National Geographic magazines at the library. Each of the four hands sported six webbed digits, blunt at the ends but adorned with bony spikes below the tips. Dex figured that a love squeeze from any one of those wicked hands would kill the strongest of prey.
The powerfully built torso narrowed at armor-plated hips. A pair of gray-scaled tyrannosaurus-like legs supported its gargantuan bulk. The enormous toes were webbed, but unlike the creature's fingers, lethal claws curled down from each.
Dex hoped to hell that this mythical abomination was just that --- mythical. If not, it would certainly be the most formidable fiend on Earth. Unstoppable.
Dex looked out over the lake. This statue certainly didn't resemble the Miccosukee monster depicted in the Seminole drawings. Were there two monsters?
Dex lowered the light to the six-foot urns. He moved closer and inspected the side ornaments that he had mistakenly identified as handles. Instead, he now realized that they were shackles. The long-lost worshippers of this pagan god had shackled sacrifices to the urns, but why? He didn't have a clue, but a strangely nagging curiosity seized control of his reason and drove him to learn the contents of the urns.
Like a mesmerized zombie, he stuck the flashlight between his clenched teeth, leaped up, and grabbed the upper edge of the closest urn. With a throaty growl, Dex struggled upward, his legs kicking furiously for a foothold, until his chin finally rested on the rim. He cocked his head at an angle so the light would illuminate the contents. He wished he hadn't. His hands rapidly released their tenuous grip, and he skidded down the smooth surface, crashing to the altar floor in a crumpled heap. His legs and arms were tangled.
Blood! The urn was half filled with the burgundy-black liquid. Ancient. Syrupy. Disgusting. The repulsive smell tainted his nostrils, and he fought the urge to vomit.
His dropped flashlight remained lit. Dex plucked it from the floor and stared in horror at his forearms and shirtfront. Both were damp with blood. His blood! He slowly glanced toward the glowing urn and numbly watched it absorb the last of his smeared blood. Glowing? His eyes flitted from its golden halo to his arms and back. Did his blood bring the urn to life? That was a damn scary thought! Jesus, what kind of place was this? Did that murderer, Bo Swinson, bring his women victims here and feed them to these urns? Maybe the real monster was Swinson!
What in blazes was going on? Dex gradually stretched his sore legs and regained his feet. A shocking realization supplanted his nausea. The altar urns functioned like leeches. They bled their shackled victims through their pores and absorbed each drop like a vampire sponge. Until there wasn't a drop left in their emaciated bodies. But why? What was all that blood used for?
Dex wasn't the least bit anxious to solve that puzzle while lingering on the sinister altar. He needed to get the hell outta Dodge --- and fast! For one thing, he had a strong survival instinct. Second, there was his eleven-thirty lunch meeting with John Redfeather and Professor Jilly Newton at P.F. Chang's later that morning --- he couldn't miss that. Third, he needed some sleep. He glanced at the urn. Like sleep would be possible now.
Dex's panic severed the altar's hypnotic power, and he raced down the temple steps toward the lake. As he approached the black water, an explosion echoed across the lake, and something scalded his left ribcage. He immediately dropped onto the cut-stone stairs and fingered the wound.
Some asshole had just winged him!
The Harrier jet landed at the United States Guantanamo Naval Station in Cuba, where Jackson hurriedly changed into a black, skintight Navy Seal assault wetsuit before boarding another Blackhawk helicopter. The pilot took off immediately, fully aware of his passenger's time constraints. Jackson realized the flood surrounding Demon Key would prevent the Harrier from touching down close-by, so he contacted Washington from the plane. Charlie Simmons agreed with his concerns and arranged the Guantanamo transfer.
Before Jackson knew it, the Blackhawk hovered above the Demon Key mausoleum. With a wave of thanks, Jackson swung out the door in his harness, and the pilot lowered him to the cemetery. Jackson stripped off the harness in the rain and ran up the hill toward the mausoleum. He fell once, sliding down the muddy hillside, but a grave marker stopped his descent. He frantically patted the lump in his pocket. Thankfully, the small glass bottle was still intact.
Jackson's childhood anxiety resurfaced in his consciousness, but he ignored it. There was no time for histrionics or ineffectual distractions. Every second counted. He moved more cautiously toward the mausoleum, and his anxiety engulfed him again.
Would he arrive in time to save Dex?
Bullets penetrated the large creature's scales, but its primordial nervous system was slow to transmit pain signals to its brain. But it didn't need to feel its physical injury; it smelled its blood mingle with the swamp water and became enraged.
The creature lunged up and over the first lighted airboat it encountered, its tail immediately swamping the boat and extinguishing the lights. Two men were swept into its gaping mouth on the first pass. Blood spewed from the corners as it worked its jaws rapidly, crushing its puny victims. After a single gulp, its mouth was empty again. The long tail capsized another airboat, sending three men into the water, kicking and screaming. The creature seized and swallowed them whole as its tail capsized three other airboats, spilling another dozen screaming men into the cresting whitecaps.
The sputtering men swam hell-bent-for-leather for Max Lester's boat, but it intercepted them before they splashed a dozen strokes toward their destination. With a tremendous jerk of its head, it grabbed all six with a single crushing chomp. Again, blood and screams surged briefly before disappearing down its throat.
Max fired up the engine, and the airboat lurched away in time to avoid another of the creature's swift attacks. Without glancing back, he passed mangroves at a frightening speed, while Darryl pumped round after round into the pursuing monster.
"He's gaining!" Darryl hollered for all he was worth above the roaring engine.
Max had the throttle lever pinned against the stop and couldn't coax another mile per hour from his pride and joy. The rushing wind nearly ripped his hair from his scalp, and the downpour nicked his face like shards of broken glass, but yet he endured. It was either that or take a trip down the monster's gullet.
Darryl slammed his rifle down on the aluminum deck. "Empty!" he shouted. "The bastard's closing fast! Move it! Move it, man!"
Max decided against serpentining the craft to the shore. He'd watched that fucker move back there, and it was downright agile. It could turn on a dime without losing speed. It was an out-and-out fucking hunting and killing machine.
And now it was hunting them.
In the cones of light below, Sheriff Stark observed the carnage and nearly lost his lunch. Crushed and overturned boats drifted amid a flotilla of body parts on the water's surface. The pilot pointed east toward the black jungle skyline.
"An airboat at nine o'clock, Sheriff," he cried, "And it's moving like a bat out of hell!"
"Then let's get after it. The monster must be chasing them!" Stark ordered. A smile pried his rigid lips apart for a fraction of a second. This could well be the moment he had long anticipated. His one big chance for fame. Forget the man who shot Liberty Valance. That was nothing compared to this feat.
He would be known as the sheriff who caught the Big One!
It was nearly upon the noisy prey when it sensed an enemy from above. Reluctantly, it broke off the chase and doubled back toward the deeper waters of the flooded swamp. Lights appeared above --- very bright lights. Its powerful tail sent it racing to a nearby mangrove, where it settled to the bottom beside the great tangle of roots, effectively hiding itself. The light swept over its position but didn't linger, instead choosing to follow its escaping prey.
It felt pain now, but the bleeding had slowed. Under normal circumstances, it would have stayed at the mangrove to heal, but its ravenous hunger vetoed its healing instinct. Time to move. To hunt. To feed.
When the lights faded to gray in the distance, it surged forward with one fluid motion past the wreckage, and continued its journey to the deeper water teeming with larger food. It sensed it was close to realizing its objective and further increased its speed.
"It's gone!" a jubilant Darryl screamed into Max's ear. "It turned back!"
Max didn't know whether to believe his friend or not. It might be a trick. That big fucker was smart.
Darryl's hand closed over Max's and forced the throttle back. The airboat slowed, but Max still fought to free his hand from his friend's grip.
"It's over, man. Relax, or you'll kill us hitting the shore that fast!"
Max's taut muscles ached from the stress of the chase, but he removed his hand and relinquished control of the boat to Darryl.
He shook his head and slumped into the unused pilot's seat. "Take her. I'm too fuckin' strung out."
The fast-approaching drone of a helicopter and its spotlights closed quickly on them. They looked up, wondering what the hell was happening now. Darryl brought the airboat to a stop as the light washed over them.
"You two okay?" a bull-horned voiced boomed down.
Darryl waved and nodded.
"Where's the creature?"
Both Max and Darryl exaggerated shrugs. They had no idea, and they wanted to keep it that way.
"What direction did it go?"
Darryl pointed west, behind them.
Without further conversation, the copter turned and sped back west into the darkness.
Darryl slapped his buddy's shoulder. "What say --- you ready for a brewski now?"
Max regarded him as if he was crazy. "Yeah, when I'm sitting safe and sound in my recliner at home. Now let's get the fuck outta here," he snapped.
The Broward County Sheriff's Department helicopter hovered above Mangrove Swamp where the Everglades waters joined the Florida Bay. The lights from Key Largo glowed in the distance.
There was no sign of the creature, and Sheriff Stark was furious that something so big had managed to elude them.
His selfish ambitions of celebrity status and grandeur were fading fast.
It dived into the deep water of the bay and headed north toward the plentiful hunting waters of the Ten Thousand Islands south of Naples. It knew those waters from long ago. As a young one separating from its mother.
As it swam out of the bay into the Gulf of Mexico, it became more cautious. Bigger prey meant bigger predators, and it was determined to avoid them in its weakened condition.
After a few days of feeding heavily in familiar territory and healing its wounds, it would continue its trek to locate its mysterious new provider.
Jackson was ten feet from the mausoleum when a bullet notched the closest grave marker and pelted him with stone fragments. He dropped to the mud and grass. A powerful searchlight beam pinned him low, and a familiar voice shouted over the rain gusts.
"Come out with your hands up."
Jackson shook his head. Wilkerson!
"You're trespassing on an FBI crime scene," the agent added.
Shit! Now what? He eyed the doorway. It was tantalizingly close. Could he make it before an FBI sniper nailed him?
He had to. The life of his friend was at stake.
Jackson rose, but another bullet ricocheted off the same grave marker, and the exploded fragments stung his cheek. He dropped again.
"You've got till the count of five to comply with my order, or we open fire," Wilkerson warned him. "One . . ."
Jackson peered through the tall grass bordering the marker. The rain-blurred silhouettes of Wilkerson and six special agents were backlighted on the opposite hill. He touched the belt holster securing the 40 caliber SIG Sauer he'd been given in Guantanamo. It was an effective weapon, but Wilkerson had the numbers in his favor if this standoff turned into a gunfight.
He sighed.
He had no choice but to surrender, but by doing so, he'd just sacrificed his friend.
Dex lay stunned on the altar stairs above the water line, pressing on his throbbing ribs to staunch the blood. That was the second time he'd been shot this summer, and now he was damn pissed. Some unseen coward had just clipped him, and he had no idea where that chickenshit bushwhacker was hiding in that infernal blackness.
The odds were against his survival. He was one man squaring off against a sniper, a man-eating lake monster, and a cantankerous back. He slowed his raspy breathing and listened for any clue to the shooter's position, but the grotto was infused with absolute silence. He glanced up to the altar and spotted the urn --- it still glowed. Thank God its light wasn't bright enough to illuminate him.
Another deafening explosion echoed in the grotto, and a bullet nicked his left leg. Dex howled in surprise and pain. Blood immediately stained his cotton slacks.
The asshole must have a night scope!
Dex slid down the remaining four steps into the cool black water. The liquid stung his wounds. A saltwater lake! Dex frowned. That was odd, so far inland. But he didn't exactly have time to worry about the anomaly.
He swung his gaze to the other side of the stairs. If he could make it over there, the elevated side would protect him. He knew the shooter's position now. He'd spotted the brief burst of light from the firing gun.
The son-of-a-gun was standing at the tunnel opening leading to the Swinson mausoleum.
Dex pushed off the bottom step with his good leg and silently paddled toward the other side, but despite his caution, the resulting undulations lapped the dry step above the water line. To Dex's horror, the entire temple, including the hideous demon statue, switched on like a light bulb, and he found himself bathed in its brilliant golden illumination!
He was now an easy target. He stopped kicking and despairingly sank into the depths.
A series of deafening explosions rent the stormy blackness. Jackson ducked, fearing Wilkerson's assault, but he immediately recognized the heavy artillery.
Jackson peered over his shoulder and marveled at the incredible firing speed of the Blackhawk's 50 mm cannons as they raked Wilkerson's position. He checked the opposite hill and noticed that the spotlights were dark and the FBI team was nowhere in sight. Screaming rockets rent the hillside, blasting the soggy earth into chunks of black rain.
Jackson looked up, waved gratefully at the pilot, and scrambled on all fours up the slippery slope to the mausoleum entrance. Once inside, he closed and bolted the door. Hopefully that would delay Wilkerson and his men long enough for him to execute his rescue plan.
Despite his urgency, he deliberately descended the ladder so as not to alert the enemy below. When he reached the tunnel floor, he pulled the ladder down behind him. That would buy him even more time should Wilkerson's team manage to break in to the mausoleum. He slipped a pinhole flashlight from his utility belt and directed the narrow shaft of light to the floor. Blood. Old blood. He sighed his relief.
Rocket detonations and rapid machinegun fire continued above him, and Jackson allowed himself a smallish grin. It appeared as if Wilkerson wouldn't be arriving any time soon.
A gunshot reverberated along the tunnel ahead. His grin flat-lined as Jackson loped toward the grotto. Again, his stomach was a twisted ball of knots. Would he reach his friend in time?
Whumps from the Blackhawk's attack shook the grotto ceiling, sending rock fragments cascading into the lake. The pilot was punctuating his retaliation.
Dex surfaced and spit out the nasty-tasting seawater. He heard the racket under the water, but he didn't have a clue of what was happening upstairs. It sounded like a full-scale invasion from where he floated. He glanced up and hoped the heavy blasts wouldn't bring the whole damn grotto on top of him!
But Dex didn't have time to ponder the earthquaking explosions; the sniper made certain of that. Another gunshot reverberated through the grotto, and a bullet sailed past his scalp and ricocheted off the stairway. Before the Seminole drawings of the lake monster could dissuade him, he swiftly filled his lungs again and sank into the menacing black water. Maybe the sniper would think he was dead and leave.
Dex pivoted toward the far stairway side and frog-kicked in that direction, but before he stroked twenty feet, an enormous something whooshed past him. The enormous shape violently brushed his body and sent him into a tumbling spin!
Panicked, Dex kept his eyelids squeezed shut and his lips clamped together as his body spun out of control. Ass over apple cart! Wooziness supplanted his wounds' fiery pain, and nausea impelled his stomach contents up into his throat. Before he could vomit, Dex burst through the surface with slapping splashes, swallowed the contents pooled in his throat, and rapidly gulped the grotto's dank atmosphere, momentarily neglecting the dangers above and below the lake. He was thrilled to be alive.
Another bullet pierced the lake's surface, barely missing him by a few inches. He blinked away the stinging saltwater, but everything was a blur. The temple's golden light. The lake's surface. Aghast, Dex turned left, then right, attempting to assess his position. He was unsure which direction led to safety. Where was the side of that blasted stairway, anyway?
He was trapped. Dead in the water. Christ, he hated that expression!
He imagined a gaping mouth the size of a Lincoln Navigator rising from the bottom, zeroing in on his treading legs. Then he pictured the night-sighted gunman with Dex's forehead squarely in his scope sights. Shit the bread, Fred! He was dead in the water.
The muted pounding stopped above. Still, ceiling rubble dropped like hail, but Dex didn't much care anymore. He resolutely closed his eyes and calmly awaited death.
Jackson paused near the end of the tunnel as the second gunshot ripped the tomb-like silence. His ears rang momentarily, and he dropped to a knee to appraise the situation. A gunman's outline appeared at the tunnel's mouth, illuminated from a golden light somewhere inside the grotto. He winced as another psychic vision invaded his mind. Not now! It ceased as abruptly as it had begun, leaving him with vital information about the shooter. The gunman was a she.
Jackson knew the target's identity, but what he didn't know was why she was shooting at him. He watched as she prepared to fire again. The woman wore infrared night goggles over her eyes and coolly adjusted her rifle sight toward a target to her right. He heard panicked splashing from the lake. Dex.
Jackson anxiously watched her cocked arm stiffen, her finger curl over the trigger, and her pursed lips release a controlled breath. The unseen splashing ceased. Jackson realized from his jungle vision that his wounded friend was too weak to put up a fight, so he simply waited for death.
And in a few seconds, it would be headed his way in the form of a bullet.
Jackson had to act fast!
He eased a flash grenade from its clip on his belt, yanked the pin, and rolled it into the grotto. The shooter reacted to the sudden noise by pivoting and pointing the rifle into the darkness. Just as Jackson wanted. The grenade detonated in a burst of dazzling white light and temporarily blinded her. She screamed, tore the goggles from her head, and frantically dug the knuckles of her free hand into her useless eyes. The rifle went off, but the bullet harmlessly ricocheted off the tunnel wall behind Jackson.
He quickly covered the distance between them, lowered his shoulder, and plowed into her midsection. Her rifle pitched upward and flew to the edge of the lake. They rolled over the rocky grotto floor together. He landed atop her, his knees pinning her shoulders, but she refused to submit. She struggled like a cornered animal, scratching and kicking wildly.
"Dex!" Jackson shouted at the top of his lungs. "I need some help over here!"
There was no answer.
"Now!"
"I'm comin', dammit! Hold your horses," the sheriff's remote voice growled. "I've been shot. Twice!"
"I know! Suck it up and get over here quick, or you and I'll both be history!" Jackson yelled.
A limp, waterlogged figure struggled from the water onto the golden stairs, caught his breath, and loped awkwardly along the stone path, groaning and swearing along the way. Dex's soaked shoes squished as he half-stumbled and half-jogged toward Jackson.
"Wait'll I . . . get my hands . . . on that shooter!" Dex huffed.
Meanwhile, Jackson had his hands full. The woman was no longer entirely human. She/it was rapidly transforming into a hideous creature the way Demmy had inside the boat on the rainforest river, and her strength was escalating. It took all of Jackson's brawn to keep her arms pinned against the rocky surface.
Dex stopped behind Jackson, stooping and gasping for air. Suddenly, his eyes widened and his jaw dropped. "Jesus mother of Mary!" he exclaimed. "It's Teddi!"
"No shit!" Jackson managed between clenched teeth. "Get down here and pin her left arm down while I get out the antidote!"
Dex eased down beside his friend and propped both his knees on her arm, while Jackson released his grip and fumbled around inside his pocket for the small bottle.
"Well, if that don't beat all!" Dex cried out incredulously.
"What?" Jackson asked irritably.
"Snakes are growin' out of her fingertips!"
Hissing black vipers swelled from her fingers and exposed their poisonous fangs; their beady eyes bored into Dex's horrified gaze.
"Yeah, I know." Jackson tugged the bottle free while holding down Teddi's right side. Wriggling vipers were emerging from that hand as well. Their presence rattled his composure, and he fumbled the bottle while attempting to remove the lid. The antidote plummeted through an opening between Teddi's shoulder and his knee toward the hard grotto floor.
Dex's hand snagged the fragile container an inch from the ground!
"I'll hold the damned thing while you unscrew the cap," he suggested through gritted teeth. His struggle with Teddi, or whatever she was now, aggravated his wounds.
Jackson quickly unscrewed the cap.
The five vipers writhed inches from Dex's face like charmed cobras. He thought about grabbing her hand and subduing the snakes, but he wouldn't have enough time; they were too close. He heard a plastic bottle cap bounce off the ground a few times with hollow pings before rolling down the slight slope toward the lake.
Jackson tipped Dex's hand until the wax-like ball dropped into his palm. He pinched it between his thumb and index finger and thrust it toward Teddi's contorted mouth. Suddenly, a forked purple tongue shot past her bloated lips toward his hand. Jackson quickly withdrew the antidote. Now what?
Before he could brainstorm, Dex's fist flew past Jackson's stationary hand and pummeled the grotesque tongue and mouth with the force of a jackhammer. Her head momentarily lolled to the side, and the writhing snakes sank to the shore.
"Now, Jackson!" he yelled.
The psychic thrust the antidote toward her mouth, and then paused. The vipers were slowly recovering, and they gradually raised their triangular heads.
"Jackson, do it!" Dex pressed. "What the hell are you waitin' for?"
Teddi's eyelids rose to reveal dancing yellow and crimson flames. Dex tried to tear his gaze away from them, but they held him in a powerful hypnotic embrace.
Jackson was strangely oblivious to her wicked charms; instead, his consciousness traveled back to the rainforest where he listened to Yokie's advice near the DEA campsite.
No use all that magic on the evil in your friend.
Jackson heard himself speaking. You want me to save some of it? But why?
You know when time comes.
The memory faded, and he examined the antidote ball, turning it over and over between his thumb and finger. Save some. Good idea. But he wasn't exactly sure why it was a good idea.
"Jackson! Get the lead out!" Dex sputtered.
The snakes danced at eye-level now, threatening to strike any second. Glistening amber venom trickled from their fangs and splashed onto the rocky floor.
Jackson maneuvered his right knee atop Teddi's heaving chest to free his other hand. He pinched off a third of the antidote ball and stuffed the rest into his shirt pocket. Without further delay, he forced the antidote beneath her squirming tongue.
Within seconds, unearthly banshee wails escaped her lips with hurricane force, blowing him and Dex off her body. The snakes dropped limply to the ground and receded into her fingertips. She lashed out with her arms and legs like a madwoman, hitting and gouging herself in the process. Blood stained her clothing, and purplish-black contusions rose on her face. A cloud of hornets swarmed from her mouth and formed a buzzing obsidian cloud above her attackers. Then suddenly, the hornets vanished, and Teddi's struggles ceased. Her eyelids dropped, and she fell back, unconscious, on her back. Jackson allowed himself a whopper sigh of relief before glancing over at his wounded partner.
Jackson's expression slumped.
The sheriff was regarding him with hostile eyes like yawning blast furnaces, engorged with yellow and crimson eddies. Jackson had not foreseen this chilling turn of events during his rainforest vision.
He and Teddi were in big trouble.
As the ravenous marine creature neared Florida's Ten Thousand Islands just west of Everglades City, it slowed and surfaced to fill its lungs with air. After a single monstrous inhale, its instincts prickled danger. A familiar death malodor permeated the briny air. Birds. Shellfish. Turtles. All dead.
The Florida red tide was in full bloom along the Gulf of Mexico shoreline, from the Ten Thousand Islands to the northerly Big Bend and Panama City. This occurrence was known as algal bloom, an occasion in which marine algae accumulate rapidly, or "bloom." The blooms formed dense, visible red patches at the water's surface, and although scientists were oblivious to the causes of red tide, they were familiar with its devastation of marine life.
Some of the algae produced large amounts of toxins, such as demonic acid, which caused neurological damage in marine mammals. The red tide toxins became highly concentrated in marine creatures, because they have the ability to consume large quantities of poisoned plankton. When other marine life consumed these toxic carriers, they died.
The primitive sea creature had encountered this strange water-borne death twice throughout its lengthy lifespan, and during the second incident, it was fortunate to escape to the deep waters beyond death's reach and fully recover.
It would not make the same mistake and blunder into the mysterious red tide again.
Although the creature preferred hunting in the shallows where it could also heal, it twisted its large snake-like body to the west and swam swiftly toward the open waters.
Its mounting hunger seared its senses with rage and urgency. It was starving.
A retired sports fisherman, Hal Watson, sat on the stern deck of his thirty-eight-foot Silverton and scanned the Gulf with his powerful binoculars. The brim of his Panama hat fluttered in the light breeze. Alice, his bronzed twenty-something mistress, lay naked on the bow catching some rays. She hated fishing, but loved sunning, drinking, spending money, and wild sex.
Miami Beach, like the rest of South Florida, was smothered by unrelenting storm clouds. Sunshine state, hell! He was forced to cruise south through the Florida Bay and a mile into the Gulf until he located some precious sunlight for his eye candy, Muffy.
Hal followed a Coast Guard cutter as it moved into shallow water along the coastline. Judging by its crawling speed, he guessed that it was searching for something. He panned the binoculars over the glistening waters encircling his boat, The Rum Pirate, looking for drug smugglers, but there were no other boats in sight.
He spotted a small school of bottlenose dolphins that had been lazily swimming in his direction for the past thirty minutes. He desperately wanted to cast his baited line and bring a few of them home, but he had neglected to renew his fishing license. With the damn Coast Guard hanging around, he didn't dare fish. He didn't feel lucky today. The last thing he needed was a damn ticket or his boat impounded.
The dolphins drew within a couple hundred feet of The Rum Pirate, and the Coast Guard was still within sight. Hal ran his fingers through his damp, salt-and-pepper hair. What the hell was the matter with them? Why didn't they gun their engines, move up the coast, and leave him alone? There was nothing out here. Couldn't they see that?
Hal popped the tab of another sweating beer can and took a long swig. He was so exasperated about not fishing that he barely tasted it. The wind picked up, and The Rum Pirate bobbed on the medium chop. He disliked how the Silverton rode so high in the water. When he took her out of Miami Beach, he always maintained a course near shore, because she wasn't what he considered seaworthy.
Hal took another swallow of beer and glanced out over the stern rail. He didn't need his binoculars now. The dolphins frolicked within a hundred feet. He sat heavily in his fishing chair and sighed. This was torture. Out-and-out torture.
He stared at his fishing rod, then at the live bait chest to his right. His sun-furrowed complexion compressed into a frown. Muffy would return with a tan, and he would go home empty handed.
After gulping the rest of his beer, Hal angrily tossed the empty can into the water. He turned toward the cutter and considered giving them a one-finger salute, when to his surprise, he noticed that it was moving quickly north. Within minutes, the cutter was a gray lump on the horizon.
Hal smiled, and his bushy silver eyebrows arched. Without wasting another second, he baited the thick hook and cast it out over the stern in the direction of the dolphins. He fastened himself into the chair harness and tucked the pole handle into a cylindrical holder clamped to the deck. He was ready for some action!
The dolphins closed to within fifty feet. They playfully dived and surfaced like performers at Sea World. They didn't seem to have a care on their puny little mammal minds. Hal laughed.
Well, I'll give them something to think about once I snag the first one and start reeling that poor bastard in!
Suddenly, the line went taut! Hal propped his feet against the stern and released more line. Let tomorrow's dinner run for a while and really set the hook. The reel clicked as it released more and more line. The minutes ticked by.
Time to begin reeling. Hal locked the reel and braced himself for the inevitable tug. Wham! The dolphin nearly jerked him out of the chair. Thank God he'd buckled himself in. That was one powerful dolphin!
Hal fought the dolphin for half an hour. His leg and arm muscles were softening to putty, but he held on. Experience taught him that the prize would be his inside another fifteen to twenty minutes.
Ten minutes later, the hooked dolphin appeared spent, and Hal reeled it in quickly. The other dolphins followed their companion to the boat as if curious about its fate. As Hal lifted his prize from the hissing waves, the other dolphins suddenly broke from their tight formation and swam off in different directions.
Before Hal could even consider a reason for their puzzling retreat, a huge sea creature exploded from the waves, seized Hal's prize dolphin in its seven-foot jaws, and fell back beneath the waves. Hal heard Muffy scream behind him, but it seemed distant. He merely gawked at the broken line dangling from the end of his pole, unable to think or reason. His mind was frozen with shock.
"Hal, baby!" she screamed from atop the cabin. "What kinda monster fish was that? A whale?"
Hal remained silent.
"I want to leave," she shouted. "Now, goddammit! I'm fuckin' scared!"
A piercing horn rode the breeze and skimmed the waters. Muffy jerked her nude oil-slicked body toward the approaching Coast Guard cutter and waved frantically. As she bent to grab a beach towel, the sea creature burst from the Gulf again and snatched her off the upper deck with its massive jaws. The sharp teeth crunched her squirming figure flat in one motion as it crashed back into the water.
Lieutenant Doug Darby lowered his binoculars and turned to his companion. "Did you fuckin' see that?"
Captain Simon Stuart kept his gaze trained on the agitated red water beside the Silverton. "I saw it."
"What the hell was it?"
"It wasn't a fish or a shark."
"Whale?"
"Did you really get a good look at that thing?" Stuart snapped.
"Well, yeah."
"Then how could you ask something so stupid?"
"Okay, what do you think it was?"
Stuart turned toward Darby. "A sea serpent."
Darby mulled over his superior's identification for a moment. "They're going to think we're nuts --- you realize that?"
"Not really." Stuart grinned smugly. "Jamison taped the whole incident with the nude woman from the main deck."
Darby glanced down. Seaman Jamison stood leaning over the rail three decks below clasping a digital camcorder.
"They'll think we doctored the tape," Darby persisted.
"Just who the hell are they?"
"You know, the press and the general population."
Stuart tossed his back and laughed. "They're not going to see the tape."
Darby was more than a little confused now. "Then who is?"
"The President of the United States."
"No shit!" Darby's brown eyes widened. "Why him?"
"'Cause he's the only government honcho who can sanction the secret military support needed to kill that sea serpent."
"They're going to kill it?"
Stuart smiled again. "Oh yeah."
Darby raised his binoculars again. They were nearly alongside the Silverton.
"Kinda makes you think that the same thing mighta happened to the Loch Ness monster," the lieutenant remarked.
"We gotta do what we gotta do. Can't have the general public going ape-shit now, can we?"
"But this is a great scientific discovery!" Darby insisted. "Our sea serpent would prove that such things really exist."
Stuart shook his head. "Too frightening for the average John Doe." He paused. "The government does the same thing with UFOs, too, I hear."
Darby trained his gaze on Hal Watson, still mesmerized by his broken line. "What about him? He saw the thing up close and personal."
Stuart shrugged. "Looks like a candidate for the funny farm to me."
"They wouldn't do that."
"And if you say anything about what you saw today to anyone outside this ship, you'll be a candidate for the loony bin, too."
"What a crock!"
"Just keep this under your hat, and you'll have nothing to worry about."
"You're serious."
"Very."
Darby considered his captain's advice. "We're alongside the Silverton now. Let's go down and rescue that poor slob."
"And?"
"Help him forget what he saw and remember what he didn't," Darby replied.
Stuart grinned. "And what exactly did he forget?"
"He forgot that he saw his wife slip and fall overboard. Of course, she drowned before we could get here and rescue her."
Stuart slapped Darby on the back. "I think you're on to something there, Doug old boy. Let's board the . . ." He glanced down at the Silverton's stern. ". . . The Rum Pirate."
"Aye, sir."
Dex sprang at Jackson with cat quickness, but the psychic was even faster. Jackson rolled away, and Dex crashed to the rocky floor with a resounding smack. Jackson broke the remaining antidote ball in half, stuffed the last piece back into his pocket, and leaped on Dex's back. Dex growled and shook Jackson from his back like a dog shedding water.
The psychic went flying, and the ball slipped from his grasp and rolled against Teddi's unconscious form. Dazed, Jackson sat up and massaged his forehead. Before he could recover enough to retrieve the antidote, Dex was on him, wolf-like fangs snapping inches from his face. Jackson punched the transformed countenance and tried to throw his attacker with his bucking hips, but Dex was too strong. His bullet wounds had been absorbed by an evil force and replaced by a thick black animal coat.
Dex's nose was now a bear snout protruding above a ferocious mouth. Jackson kept wailing away on the bony face, but he knew it was a lost cause if he couldn't escape Dex's increasing weight.
Three-inch claws sprouted from Dex's fingertips. Jackson moaned. One rake from those lethal nails would easily end the fight.
The Dex monstrosity raised a paw above its head, roared savagely, and thrust it toward Jackson's chest. The psychic twisted to move out of its path, but he was hopelessly pinned to the grotto floor. Jackson raised his left hand to intercept the blow, but Dex's powerful thrust reduced his arm's feeble resistance to that of a flaccid twig.
The downward swipe continued toward Jackson's heart.
Suddenly, a gunshot rang out, and the Dex monstrosity snapped its head around in surprise. Teddi stood behind it, her handgun barrel raised level with its face, and fired again. A surreal wail swelled throughout the grotto as it frantically clutched its face. Jackson scooted out from between its thick legs and searched for the antidote. It was rolling awkwardly toward the lake!
Jackson leaped up, dived for the shoreline with his arms extended, and plucked it from the water's edge. His momentum pushed him into the shallows, and he squeezed the wax-like ball for all he was worth to keep it dry.
When he finally stopped skidding, he attempted to stand, but a strong force bumped him hard from behind. He flew out of the water and into the air toward the tunnel entrance. He landed directly at the monster's feet. Jackson glanced nervously at the lake, but whatever had propelled him out of the water had vanished. He glanced up. Dex now stood eight feet tall!
The creature bent and lifted Jackson off the ground like he was a rag doll. The razor claws punctured his back, and he felt blood rivulets trickle down his flesh. A brutal pain erupted, and Jackson screamed.
Why wasn't the damn thing dead? Teddi shot it point blank in the face.
He saw that she had retreated from its lethal reach, and she now targeted the creature's spine. Another gun blast. It arched its back and roared its agony.
Jackson quickly shoved his fist into its open mouth and deposited the antidote under its tongue. Immediately, Dex's bear body shuddered from a tumultuous seizure. Jackson felt its grip loosen, and he plummeted to the floor. He yelled out in pain as he landed on his hip and shoulder. Again.
Abruptly, the pain vanished, and Jackson suddenly felt like a million bucks. His spent strength returned, and he leaped to his feet like a nimble gymnast. Teddi eyed him suspiciously, slowly pointing the gun barrel in his direction.
What was she doing?
Then he knew.
Yokie had been very wise. Either that, or he'd seen more of that vision than Jackson.
He slipped his hand into his shirt and stuffed the remainder of the antidote beneath his own tongue, while he still had control over his actions.
His strength ebbed, and the pain in his back, shoulder, and hip throbbed unmercifully.
A black mist rose from within Jackson's body like a black soul. It spun into a wispy funnel cloud and approached Teddi and Dex again. But it didn't enter. Couldn't enter. The funnel spun tighter and drifted out over the lake. Within seconds, it dissipated.
Teddi ran to Jackson and pulled him to his feet.
"We've got to get out of here before it comes back," she cried.
Jackson slung an arm around her shoulders and pulled her tight. "It's not coming back. We're immune to it."
She blinked. "How? I mean, why?"
"There'll be time to explain later. Now let's see to Dex. He's in bad shape."
"Dex?" She turned to see the sheriff stretched out on the shore, the shredded remnants of his uniform clinging to him. "I shot him! I remember now." Tears welled in her eyes.
"That thing wasn't Dex."
"But I see bullet wounds."
"Uh, that's when you shot him earlier tonight."
She burst out in tears. "I don't understand any of this," she screamed. "When did I recover from my coma? Can you answer that?"
Jackson hugged her tightly and kissed her forehead. "All in good time. Just be patient."
Teddi wasn't satisfied with his reply, but she helped Jackson pull Dex to his feet.
"My patience only lasts so long," she told Jackson.
He nodded.
Dex glanced at them, and then scowled at Jackson. "Just what the Sam Hill happened to me? And why was Teddi shootin' at me again?"
"Let's just say you weren't your normal self at the time."
He appraised Jackson skeptically. "Oh yeah. Then what was I?"
"A real pain in the ass," Jackson replied. "Now I'd like to take a look at that temple you found."
"Well, I just want to get the blazes outta here and have somebody clean and dress these wounds," the sheriff protested.
"I want out, too," added a sobbing Teddi. "And I'm sorry about shooting you, Dex."
Dex waved his hand dismissively and groaned. "Ah, think nothing of it."
Jackson cleared his throat. "But the temple might hold the secret to our monster investigation."
"It don't hold shit, Jackson!" he retorted tetchily. "Trust me."
"Then you both take off. I'm staying to check it out."
Dex and Teddi exchanged weary glances, then followed Jackson's lead toward the temple.
The temple's luminosity had weakened to a pale champagne by the time they climbed over the sidewall onto the stairs. During their hike around the lake, Dex described his appalling experience with the vampire properties of the urns. He purposely left out the part about the lake creature. One amazing creepy story was hard enough to swallow.
Jackson listened attentively as he contemplated the menacing pagan statue above the altar. The one phenomenon Dex couldn't explain was the temple's glow.
"When did the temple light up?" Jackson asked.
Dex scratched the stubble on his chin. "I'd say about the time I went for a swim."
"Where'd you enter the water?"
Dex pointed at the bottom step at the water's edge. "There."
Jackson knelt and inspected the step. The temple glow was nearly extinguished, as he frantically searched the immediate area for a trigger or switch. He found nothing.
"Maybe the trigger's on one of the underwater steps," Teddi suggested, beginning to feel like her old self. Her joints ached from weeks of inactivity, but she masked the pain. After all, Dex was worse off in the pain department than she was, and she was to blame.
Jackson's gaze followed his flashlight beam into the water. "There are quite a few steps down there." He studied the shoreline behind them. "I'm guessing that the lake's water level is much lower during normal rainfall seasons, and a lot more of this temple is exposed."
"So?" Dex pressed, his pain tolerance nearly eroded, along with his patience.
"None of this madness began until the flooding rains," Jackson reminded them. "The Swinson murders. The voodoo magic that infected all three of us."
"Where are you going with this?" Teddi demanded, anxious to leave the grotto.
"In light of Dex's encounter, it seems reasonable to believe that the high water in this lake could very possibly be the catalyst for awakening the temple's evil," Jackson theorized. "But for some strange reason, it didn't stay awake."
Dex and Teddi watched Jackson again probe the areas adjacent to the final dry step. Suddenly, he stopped and splashed his flashlight beam across its surface.
Jackson glanced up at them. "Notice anything different about this step?"
They moved closer and compared it with the others.
"That last one looks kinda moldy," Teddi observed.
"Yeah, I see it, too," Dex chimed in.
"It's not mold. It's black, because it's not the same kind of rock as the other steps," Jackson said.
"Why would the builders do that?" Dex muttered.
Teddi snapped her fingers. Despite a splitting headache, it felt good to be able to think again. "This is farfetched, but maybe it has some kind of magical properties."
"Not as farfetched as you think." Jackson stooped over and splashed water on the step. The temple's luminance increased.
"I'll be damned," Dex said.
"You probably will be," Teddi ribbed him. Her sense of humor was recovering, too. "So the step's some kind of magical water switch. What's the big deal?"
Jackson grinned. "When the water level rises another quarter of an inch, the temple's light will be sustained for a much longer period of time."
Dex winced from his aching wounds. "So who's going to know? It's hidden down in this grotto," he grumbled.
"Don't you see, someone's waiting for this temple to come alive, so he can unleash whatever ancient power is stored here."
Teddi folded her arms across her chest and shivered. "Like who?"
Jackson's grin faded. "Like whoever sicced that evil spirit on you." He sighed. "But as far as identifying that person, we're back to square one."
"Think it might be a local?" Dex prodded.
"Swinson's dead, and that leaves who?" Teddi added, hooking Dex's arm.
Jackson shrugged and ran his hand absently along the step's smooth black surface. "That's the million-dollar question, but I expect him to show up soon."
"You seem pretty positive about that," Teddi said.
Jackson nodded and patted the black step. "I am. Another quarter of an inch and the curtains rise on his magic show. And by now, he'll be desperate to kill us since we've neutralized his evil spirit. He can't afford to have us hanging around ruining his plans, whatever they are. We're the only ones wise to his grotto game."
"I don't feel too wise at the moment." Dex scowled, then looked over at Teddi. "At least we have answers to a couple of your questions: what's so special about this time of year and what has occurred to instigate the ritual, although you were talking about Swinson at the time."
She nodded. "The rain. It has the power to reactivate this ancient temple. That leads me to another whole set of questions . . ."
Dex raised his free arm. "Whoa, let's celebrate the discovery of these answers before you go huntin' up some new questions. Deal?"
"Deal." She laughed thinly. "Any idea about who our voodoo man is?" Teddi asked.
Jackson shook his head. "I've made an inquiry, but I haven't heard anything back yet."
"How about using your psychic powers?"
"I've tried, but I can't break through. It's like he's blocking my abilities with his." He contemplated her suggestion. "But, I guess I can try again."
Jackson moved to Teddi's side and gently clasped her hand. He closed his eyes, waiting for a vision. After several fruitless minutes, he sighed and released her hand.
"Nothing," he lamented. "Teddi, can't you remember anything you did after you left the hospital?"
She frowned and mulled it over. "I can't remember anything since Swinson tried to kidnap me."
Jackson brightened and snapped his fingers. "Hmm."
"You're Mister Sunshine all of a sudden," she snapped. "What's up?"
He ignored her. "Dex, did you visit Teddi a lot in the hospital?"
"Well, yeah, sure."
"And did you talk to her?"
He nodded sheepishly. "Yeah. You know, just in case she could hear me."
"Don't feel bad. I did more than that --- a lot more. Teddi convinced me that she'd developed mental telepathy, and she actually spoke to me on various subjects, including my secret trip to Brazil."
"I don't remember any of that," she objected.
"You did more than that," Dex said. "Especially down in the hospital cafeteria. I was with Jackson, and we both witnessed your out-of-body, telepathic tricks."
Jackson nodded. "So, it appears that the whole time we thought we were talking with you, we were communicating with the person responsible for your coma. That's how he knew to arrange ambushes for me in the rainforest."
The others gawked.
"I foolishly revealed that my Brazil trip objective was to locate an antidote for Teddi, and our voodoo man was determined to stop me."
Dex pressed his hand against his rib wound to ease the pain. "Well, I don't remember everythin' I told her."
"Can you remember what you talked about during your last visit?"
"Well, I reckon I might've told her somethin' about my Everglades trip with John Redfeather."
"Really? I've got to hear that one."
"You will. I have a lunch date later this mornin' with John and this snooty professor from Florida Atlantic University. We're goin' to try and make heads or tails of our findin's." He paused. "And I've got to bring you up to date on the monster that escaped this grotto lake. Its playin' havoc with the gators in the Everglades."
"I saw them on the flight over here." He peered into the lake. "There must be some reason why it left the safety of the grotto after Swinson died." He shook his head. "Another damn piece to fit into our puzzle."
"This is becoming one helluva puzzle," Teddi muttered.
Jackson licked his lips and asked quietly, "Teddi, do you know where you docked your boat or parked your car tonight?"
She tried her best to stimulate a memory, but it was hopeless. Her slate was blank. "Sorry, but I just can't remember squat," she replied, frustration tainting her words. "I can't even remember coming out here in the first place."
"Don't sweat it," Jackson said. "Let's hit the road. We've got a lot of ground to cover before we crash that lunch meeting with Dex this morning."
"Does your itinerary include a stop at a local hospital?" Teddi asked.
"Yeah --- sure. Of course."
She gave Jackson a frail hug. "You look frazzled, Jackson."
He managed a weak grin. "I am. We've got a measly quarter inch of lake floodwater left to go before this step is activated and all hell breaks loose."
"You're overlookin' one minor detail," Dex said facetiously.
"Yeah? What's that?"
"Our mystery guy holds all the cards. He could walk right up to us with a bomb in a pizza box, and we wouldn't be the wiser. That's enough hell breakin' loose for me!"
"We're not safe wherever we go until we nab him. Is that it?"
"In a nutshell."
Teddi shivered. Now that was a cheery thought. "I don't think that's the only thing bugging you, Jackson," she pressed.
The psychic frowned. "I thought I was the only intuitive one in the group."
"You're stalling," she prodded.
"All right, you nailed me. I'm worried about Zeus." He paused. "A possessed Brazilian tribal chief warned me that Zeus and I were about to become history, and with you guys keeping me busy here, I haven't had a chance to go home to check on him," Jackson responded gravely. "Zeus wouldn't stand a chance against our voodoo man."
Although that was true, his real concern was the mass killing he'd witnessed in his jungle psychic vision. Both Teddi and Dex died in it!
Once again, he'd have to find a way to short-circuit fate to prevent that horrifying vision from becoming a reality.
Leus raised his nose and sniffed the bayou breezes from his doghouse on stilts. The air was humid and thick with scents, but he remained inside the screened safety of his porch. There would be no playing and chasing varmints through the bayou today. An extraordinary sensation stimulated the large Rottweiler's seldom-stirred preservation instinct, and although there was no explicit danger floating among the scents in the light summer breeze, Zeus deferred to the high road of caution.
Something was out there. Coming for him.
He lay still in the escalating morning heat and maintained a wary vigil.
Everyone aboard the Coast Guard cutter held a top-secret government security clearance. This was a special crew. They dealt primarily with the country's offshore Homeland security issues. They didn't chase drug smugglers, unless there wasn't another Coast Guard team in that particular crime area.
Captain Simon Stuart ordered Jeff Jamison to the bridge. Jamison ejected the mini-DVD from the ship's digital camcorder with eight-gigabyte memory and a 25X optical zoom, and slipped it into the top desk drawer in his workroom. He would replay it for the captain later, and then seal the video for delivery to the Secret Service agents who were standing by to greet the cutter in Tampa.
Doug Darby waited until Jamison left his workroom before entering. Darby located the mini-DVD with the sea serpent footage and loaded it into Jamison's computer. Within minutes, he had skillfully copied the data to a full-size DVD. He returned the mini-DVD to the drawer and closed the computer's DVD copy windows. Cracking the door ajar, Darby checked the corridor for traffic. Seeing no one, he crept away.
Three hours after the Coast Guard cutter docked in Tampa Bay, Darby strode into a seedy neighborhood bar on the fringes of downtown Tampa and slipped into a booth. The green leather-like cushion was cracked with age, and the stuffing was rearranged into uncomfortable lumps. He scooted along the padded bench until he found a somewhat tolerable section. He didn't really mind the discomfort. He didn't plan to be there long.
A waitress with too much girth and too little makeup sauntered over and asked the usual question without enthusiasm.
"Whadda have?"
"Whatever dark beer you have on tap."
She retreated toward the bar. Sitters and standers, all trying to catch the Florida Marlins baseball game, packed the curved counter. Darby couldn't see who they were playing, and he didn't give a hoot. When he left this shit-hole of a bar, he would be a rich man.
The front door opened, and a man wearing a Tampa Bay Buccaneers polo shirt and toting a small portfolio scanned the bar. His gaze settled on Darby. The lieutenant recognized him immediately. He was a noted columnist who wrote for The New York Times.
The columnist strode straight to the booth and slid into the bench opposite Darby.
"You Doug Darby?" he asked sharply.
Darby nodded. "You got the cash?"
The columnist patted the black leather portfolio.
Darby untucked his tee shirt, tugged apart the Velcro strap encircling his waist, and removed the DVD. He placed it on the table. The columnist unzipped the portfolio and pushed a thick envelope across the table. He grabbed the DVD sleeve, checked that there was a disc inside, and then deposited it inside the portfolio.
The waitress arrived and plunked the beer mug in front of Darby.
"You want to run a tab?" she asked.
Darby pulled a ten-dollar bill out of his wallet and handed it to her.
"Keep the change," he said.
The waitress grunted something that resembled thanks, and turned to the columnist. "You want somethin'?"
The columnist shook his head.
"Suit yourself." She left and serviced the next booth.
"This is, uh, of the highest quality?"
Darby bristled. "Of course. This is exactly what you-know-who will see," Darby retorted, referring to their earlier conversation when he had name-dropped the President of the United States.
"Very good." The columnist slid from the booth. "Goodbye."
Darby watched him go. What a prick. Didn't even say thanks. He glanced at the thick envelope on the table beside his frosted mug and stuffed the money into his jeans pocket. I guess he figured the dough was all the thanks I needed.
His ass was sore from the lumpy bench, and he tried not to limp as he walked to the front door. The last thing he wanted to do was attract attention.
Darby stepped outside into the rainy gloom. He glanced at his watch in the red and blue light of the bar's neon window signs. Ten-oh-five. Perfect. In three hours he would be catching the red-eye to Mexico where there was no extradition. He had squeezed enough money out of The New York Times to live it up down there for many years.
He jogged around the corner to his car. He fished the remote from his pocket, but before he could press the keypad, he felt a cold gun barrel against the back of his neck.
"Shut up and don't turn around," a deep male voice commanded.
Shit! He was being robbed! Shit, shit, and double shit! His emotions plummeted from Cloud Nine and landed in Deep Shit.
"You violated your security clearance," the man revealed.
Darby panicked. Prison! Oh no! Not that! He'd rather give up the cash than spend his life inside one of those hellholes! From the enticing dreams of a sandy La Paz beach to the shocking nightmare of a cramped jail cell. Darby felt sick.
"The columnist has been robbed and beaten," the man stated nonchalantly. "His death would arouse suspicion."
Darby didn't like the way he emphasized the word his. In fact, it scared the hell out of him.
"Give me the money."
Darby's hand dropped to his jeans pocket.
"Easy now. Nice and slow," the man warned.
Darby tugged the envelope free.
"Drop it," the man ordered.
Darby swallowed. Goodbye, Mexico. Goodbye, easy life. He dropped the envelope, and it splashed into a shallow puddle.
"Say goodbye, asshole," the man growled, as his eyes blinked yellow and red.
A bullet shattered Darby's skull and scrambled his brain before he could open his mouth to beg for mercy. He slumped into the puddle.
Lieutenant Doug Darby had just received his dishonorable discharge from the United States Coast Guard.
It took a gargantuan physical effort for Teddi and Dex to scale the tunnel ladder up to the mausoleum before collapsing against the damp walls. They gulped the air in whistling wheezes. Both their complexions were chalk, and dusky bags bulged beneath their eyes.
Jackson appraised them in the soft light of the single overhead bulb. "You two all right?" he asked, concerned for their sudden onset of exhaustion.
"Just . . . just really tired," Teddi managed.
Dex was too weary to answer. He merely nodded at Teddi's reply.
Jackson didn't press the issue, although he was concerned. Suddenly, he remembered that Wilkerson and his men were still prowling the key and were probably mad as hornets. Dangerous hornets. Armed hornets. All of a sudden he didn't feel that well, either. How were they going to get past the FBI agents and return to the mainland?
The iron bolt shot back with a sharp crack. Jackson warily opened the heavy door and peered outside. It was blacker than all hell and still raining to boot. Damn! He pulled it open a little wider, and the darkness swallowed the pale yellow wedge cast from the light bulb.
"Jackson, is that you?" hissed a familiar voice.
The helicopter pilot!
"Yeah," Jackson called back, relieved to see the Blackhawk's shadowy hulk several yards away. "Can you get us out of here?"
"Who's us, sir?"
"Me and a couple friends. They both need medical treatment."
"I can fly them to any hospital with a helipad, sir."
"Great. Help me get 'em into the chopper."
Jackson looked uneasily at the leveled hill and the lighted pole barn as they stepped into the steady drizzle. His friends' energy levels were so depleted that they needed assistance marching the short distance to the Blackhawk.
The pilot chuckled. "You don't have to worry about your shootin' buddies, sir. They're pinned down inside that pole barn. I haven't seen hide nor hair of 'em for over an hour."
Jackson slapped the man on the back. "That's music to my ears." Conflicting sensations of apprehension and relief besieged him. It had been a close call beneath the mausoleum, but he had managed to save his friends' lives, even though some of the events didn't unfold exactly as they were predicted. He realized that having advance notice and acting accordingly could alter the outcomes of his visions. But, he'd triumphed despite the return of his childhood anxiety.
But there were still the foreseen deaths of Dex and Teddi to deal with somewhere in the city. Today! But where? Teddi didn't remember anything that she had done or heard during the past few weeks. He had a sneaking suspicion that she had not only been commanded to murder Dex, but also commanded to kill him and arrange what would appear to be accidents to claim the lives of the luncheon meeting attendees later that morning. It was only supposition at this point, but it was all he had to go on.
"You all right, sir?" the young pilot asked Jackson, staring at him.
The psychic realized that he was still standing in the rain, supporting Dex's flaccid frame. They were both drenched. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just a little preoccupied, that's all," he said, embarrassed. "Let's get these two to a hospital."
"Is the closest one okay?"
Jackson was silent for a few moments. "Any hospital except Holy Cross."
Inside the Oval Office in Washington DC, the angst pervading the pre-dawn meeting was palpable. President Shelton Hanover sat stiffly on a sofa in the meeting circle and eyed each of the four emergency conference invitees. The Secretary of Defense, General George Waring, and the Secretary of State, Francis Beasely, sat together and carefully surveyed the others, like attack dogs waiting to pounce on the first one who threatened their high-ranking authority. The Secretary of the Navy, Commander Jamison Plummer, wrung his hands nervously, while the FBI's Southeast Field Director Charlie Simmons' apoplectic complexion was in stark contrast to his customarily calm demeanor.
Shelton Hanover was in his early fifties and a longtime politician. He was six feet six, broad shouldered, and possessed a face that invoked both fear and compassion. Several political opponents had jokingly compared his toughness and appearance to that of a World Wrestling Federation star, but they had paid for their remarks with their political careers. Hanover was a powerful Washington figure whose influence was far-reaching. Insults and threats were dealt with swiftly through the Washington underground, and his enemies often found themselves unemployable for the remainder of their working lives. United States Senators and House Representatives disregarded Hanover's quick temper and bullying tactics in Congress, because he was a can-do politician who inspired voter confidence with his firm, decisive actions and a commonsense approach to solving problems.
Now the president was faced with one of the most bizarre national security threats of his office term. Commander Plummer had just finished narrating the incredible video footage taken by the Coast Guard in the Gulf of Mexico yesterday afternoon. Plummer guaranteed the attendees that the action sequence recorded on the DVD was no amateur video production doctored to make the sea creature look authentic. It was as real as they were.
"No one else has seen this except for the Coast Guard crew, right?" Shelton asked.
Plummer nodded. "Yes, sir, that's correct, and they all have top-secret clearances."
"Good. We wouldn't want to start a panic." The president paused. "So where's it headed, Jamison?"
"We've been tracking it for the past twenty-four hours, and all we can ascertain is that it's headed north in the Gulf of Mexico."
"North?" Francis Beasely snapped. "You can't speculate further on its potential destinations? How can we plan when we have no tangible intelligence?"
The commander leaned over the coffee table and glared at the pompous Secretary of State. "In my business, we don't hypothesize. We're not alarmists, like local newscasters and some political headline seekers. They manipulate sketchy data and always seem to err on the side of gloom and doom for ratings and votes, whether it is actually indicated or not," he replied sarcastically. "In the armed forces, we deal in certainties, and until I have intelligence in my possession that is one hundred percent accurate, I won't succumb to speculation, Mister Secretary."
Hanover jumped into the conversation before Beasely could respond. "When you do possess that information, Commander, what is your plan to neutralize this potentially devastating creature?"
"Torpedoes and heavy surface gunfire," the commander responded quickly.
"And you're certain that'll be sufficient to kill it?" the president pressed. "This isn't one of those B movies where no weapon works and the entire population of a country is threatened, is it?"
General George Waring spoke up. "No, sir, but I understand your trepidation. Jamison's assessment is correct. Unlike in the movies, the reality is that our firepower is more than sufficient to blow that thing to kingdom come."
Hanover grinned briefly. "That's what I wanted to hear, George. Now, Jamison, when are you planning to kill it? Don't forget, I want the entire operation recorded on video."
"I won't forget, sir."
Beasely coughed into his hand. "Excuse me, Mister President, but I'd like to propose that we capture the damned thing and display it in one of our zoos. Think of it as a likely windfall revenue source." His expression was tautly smug, and he added with a wink, "And, it wouldn't hurt if President Shelton's name was associated with its capture. You know, saving hundreds of the coastal people's lives and all that."
Before anyone could respond to the absurd proposition, Charlie Simmons jumped up and angrily wagged a finger at Commander Plummer. "One of your Blackhawk pilots opened fire on my agents last night at an FBI crime scene in the Everglades!" he accused Plummer. "Are you aware of that incident?"
President Hanover stood and waved Charlie down. Simmons reluctantly sat.
"We'll have no further emotional outbursts like that during one of my meetings, is that clear?" His booming voice resounded throughout the small room. Everyone nodded quickly. Hanover faced Plummer. "Is that true?"
The commander nodded. "Up to a point."
Charlie Simmons folded his arms and waited for Plummer to try and wriggle his way out of that tight spot.
"One of our young pilots on a clandestine mission with an FBI contractor found himself in a hostile situation. It seems that a group of your crime scene agents, Charlie, opened fire on their own contractor."
"What!" Charlie exploded. His arms fell to his sides.
Hanover motioned Charlie to silence. "Go on, Jamison."
The others leaned forward, anxious to see their old nemesis, the FBI, put on the hot seat.
Plummer remained stoic. "According to the information provided to my pilot from your contractor, he was there to rescue a local sheriff, a Dexter Lowe, and one of your own special agents, Teddi McCoy. When your contractor was lowered to the ground on Demon Key, a group of unidentified men opened fire on him. Our pilot responded properly in accordance with his training and protected the mission's integrity. He opened fire on the hostiles, but not to kill. He merely pinned them down."
"I see," Charlie managed through clenched teeth.
"Well, I don't!" Hanover shouted. "Who was this contractor?"
"Jackson LaFevre."
"Swamp Jack?"
"Yes, sir." Charlie Simmons' voice was nearly a whisper.
"What the hell were you thinking when you hired that crackpot?"
Simmons cleared a frog from his throat. This wasn't the time to defend Jackson's reputation. "He helped us locate the serial killer in Fort Lauderdale. Without him, we couldn't have found the perp as quickly."
Hanover remained silent for a while. "The case is solved now, right?"
Charlie wasn't about to go into that, either. Too many potential security leaks in the room. He didn't trust Beasely as far as he could spit him. "Yes, sir."
"And yet Swamp Jack is still on the FBI's payroll and saving FBI agents in distress."
"It appears so, yes."
"Your report should make fascinating reading, Charlie."
"Yes, Mr. President."
Hanover turned to Plummer. "So your pilot contends that the FBI agents fired on one of their own?"
"I read the pilot's report myself this morning, sir. That's exactly what it says."
Hanover addressed Charlie again. "What's going on over at your place? Doesn't the right hand know what the left's doing?"
Charlie's angry flush deepened to an embarrassed beet red. "That's a valid question, sir. Believe me, I will get to the bottom of this."
"You're damned right it's a valid question. I want that report in my hands by noon tomorrow!" Hanover ordered curtly.
Charlie desperately wanted to wring Special Agent in Charge Wilkerson's neck. "You'll have it."
"Now, back to the crisis at hand. Does anyone know what the hell that sea monster is and where it comes from?" Hanover asked.
Beasely raised his hand slightly, like he was still a schoolboy. "I have an expert waiting outside, if you're interested in hearing what he has to say."
"Bring him in."
"Yes, sir." The Secretary of State rose, strode to the door, and ushered a gray-haired, stooped, and scholarly man into the Oval Office. He didn't appear intimidated by the president; on the contrary, he seemed amused.
Beasely introduced Professor Janis Krug to the others, but before he could address the small group, the president's assistant knocked and shuffled into the room. She held a folded sheet of paper.
"I'm sorry to interrupt, sir, but there is an urgent message for Commander Plummer," Betty Furlong announced.
"That's quite all right, Betty. Please give the message to the commander," Hanover said, clearly intrigued by what level of urgency constituted disrupting a presidential conference.
Plummer scanned the brief communication as Betty left the room and closed the door. When he finished, his jawbone tensed and he looked ready to murder someone.
Hanover could barely stand the suspense. "Well, what is it?"
"I have to go," he said abruptly, and stood.
"What's so important that you have to leave my meeting?" Hanover insisted.
"Two of the Coast Guard crew that recorded that sea creature footage were murdered earlier this morning," he answered.
"What?"
"Yes, sir. They were both shot execution style in the back of the head."
Hanover doubled his fists. "I'm sorry."
"I'm pissed!" Plummer retorted.
"No, you misunderstand. I'm upset about their deaths, too, but what I'm sorry about is a possible security leak aboard the cutter."
"Security leak?"
"Yes. It appears as if someone else knows about our sea monster, and may have coerced those two into spilling the beans before he shot them. That constitutes big-time trouble."
Professor Krug stepped forward and pointed to the sea creature's still image projected onto a screen at the periphery of the conference circle. "That's no real sea monster, gentlemen. It's a scientific miracle of nature!" He clasped his hands excitedly at his chest. "What you're seeing is a prehistoric survivor, and it's known as a . . ."
Commander Plummer slipped from the Oval Office. It was imperative that he meet with his Coast Guard people --- immediately. Until they could devise a workable security plan, it appeared that the lives of the surviving crewmembers of the Tampa-docked Coast Guard cutter were in jeopardy.
Jackson scrolled through the recent newspaper articles on the Internet that pertained to their case. He had a lot of catching up to do since his return from Brazil.
Dex snored in the double bed across the room after his trip to the hospital. His wounds were cleaned and bandaged, and as before, there would be no permanent damage. The FBI's Dr. George examined Teddi thoroughly, and reluctantly pronounced her fit to return to work. He used the descriptive phrase "miraculous recovery" quite a few times. He would've preferred to keep her a couple days in the hospital for observation, but Teddi wasn't having any of that. She was now downstairs in her motel room grabbing a catnap before their luncheon date with John Redfeather and Dr. Jillian Newton at P.F. Chang's restaurant.
Jackson watched the newspaper's incredible video of the frightened alligators stacked atop one another on land along the highways and fenced properties skirting the eastern edge of the Everglades. After that, he found two articles that caught his attention. The first was a missing person's report that he found interesting, involving a twenty-eight-year-old woman named Tori Hopewell. After finding her shoes outside her apartment and half of the apartment's canal bridge destroyed, the sheriff's department presumed that her disappearance was related to the presence of the mysterious swamp creature. The second involved the Lapis brothers. An unknown creature had mangled their fishing boat, and they had yet to be found.
The whole scenario staggered Jackson's imagination. What kind of monster could've driven the gators from their territory? He didn't want to even contemplate it.
There was a breaking news that suddenly appeared and detailed the deaths of several locals involved in a vigilante monster hunt last night. Sheriff James Stark sighted the monster from his department helicopter last night, but the creature disappeared before he could kill it.
He scrolled down further and clicked on a new story that suggested the Everglades monster must now be terrorizing the Gulf of Mexico, since the alligators had recently returned to the swamp. Both the local drivers and property owners were grateful. Jackson hoped to read about specific Gulf incidents, but none was mentioned. He figured it was just another bloated news shell with no substance.
There was a new video link beneath the Sheriff Stark story. Jackson clicked it and was both fascinated and terrified by the grainy night footage of the Everglades monster. He leaned forward. Although he couldn't distinguish definitive physical features, he did establish its size. Compared to the airboat it chased through the swamp, the shadowy hulk was huge.
Was it possible that it was the same monster from 1856 Ike Noonan had described? Jackson massaged his temples. If it was, why did it show itself after more than a century? Was its sudden appearance related somehow to Bo Swinson's death? What the hell was it, anyway?
Too many questions and an annoying shortage of answers. Jackson doubled his fists in frustration.
He shut down the computer, yawned, and checked on Dex. Still sawing wood. The emergency room doctor's diagnosis indicated that Dex was dehydrated and anemic. His skin was torn in several places from his bear-creature morphing in the grotto, and his blood pressure was low. After administering two IVs and the proper medication, the doctor released Dex on the condition that he get plenty of bed rest.
Yeah, right!
Teddi was a different story. Her muscles were weak from weeks of coma inactivity, and Dr. George suggested that she return to Washington and receive treatment there, but Jackson realized that relocation was too dangerous. The person behind Swinson's death and Teddi's coma was intent on killing them all before the grotto lake rose another fraction of an inch and activated the temple. Splitting up would make them easier targets. He nixed that idea and endured Dr. George's tirade.
Jackson rode the elevator down to Teddi's room and swiped her room card in the magnetic door lock. She, too, was in a deep sleep. He checked that the sliding balcony door was secured, and then he returned to his room.
Jackson stretched out on the sofa and closed his eyes. Whoever had cast a spell on Teddi had to be close to her. Had to have had time to condition her brain for the psychic invasion. That's just the way the voodoo shit worked.
His number one suspect was Wilkerson. He fit the bill. Years of close physical and mental contact. Hated his ex-wife. And, he was a power monger.
But what was his connection to Swinson? And did he know voodoo?
Those answers would make or break Jackson's case against him.
He peered at his watch. A quarter to nine. He had to make two phone calls. He walked out onto the balcony, so he wouldn't disturb Dex.
The first call was to his buddy in the State Department. He picked up immediately.
"Hey, it's Jackson."
"Hi. I got the Swinson info that you wanted. I was going to call you yesterday, but then the Justice Department dumped on me. Sorry," he apologized.
"No problem. What'd you find?"
"Zippo."
"Really?"
"Sorry, again. There was only one record, and you know about them."
"Hmm." Jackson considered the problem from another angle. "Try checking immigrations from other countries," he suggested.
His friend groaned.
"I know you're up to your ass in alligators, but I really need this."
"Yeah, okay. But this better be really important."
"Lives depend on it."
"Yours?"
"Yeah, and a lot of others, too."
"Good enough. I'll call you."
"Thanks." He hung up and dialed the second number.
"Bayou Tours," a familiar voice drawled.
"Cole, it's Jackson."
"Hey, man, where you been? I haven't seen you around for a couple weeks," Cole said in his usual cheerful voice.
"Here and there."
"FBI stuff, huh?"
"Something like that. Say, I was wondering if you'd do me a favor when you're out by my place."
"Name it, man."
"Could you stop and see if Zeus is all right?"
"He running out of dog food or something?"
"He shouldn't be." He paused. "Just see if he's . . . safe."
"You expecting trouble?"
"Might be."
"Okay, consider it done. I'll be out that way this afternoon. I'll give you a shout on your cell."
"I'd appreciate that."
"You owe me."
Jackson chuckled. "Yeah, I'm always in your debt, aren't I?"
"I'm still waiting for the paybacks, man."
"I'll make it up to you --- I promise."
"I'm not holding my breath."
Jackson laughed. "Smart man."
"Anything else?"
"Yeah." Jackson searched for the right words. "Watch your back."
Jackson frowned at the engorged charcoal clouds looming overhead as he drove Dex's patrol car to their P.F. Chang's meeting. Teddi sat beside him, while Dex lay sprawled in the backseat.
He veered off I-95 onto the Glades Road exit and turned east. The restaurant was located in a small shopping strip across from Florida Atlantic University's scenic campus. Jackson parked a considerable distance from the restaurant.
"Jesus, you expect us to hike from here?" Dex complained.
"A little exercise will do you good."
"Says who? The ER doc told me to get plenty of bed rest."
Jackson grinned. "What does he know, anyway?"
Dex grumbled but got out of the car.
"You two keep the appointment, and I'll hang around out here and nose around for trouble," Jackson volunteered, concerned that Teddi might've booby-trapped the restaurant before shooting at Dex in the grotto.
His heart suddenly beat a frenzied tattoo as he recognized the restaurant's architecture from his Brazilian psychic nightmare. Jesus, this was the place where he had envisioned so many deaths! His breathing came in short huffs. If there was a booby trap, he'd have to locate it and disarm it quickly. His old anxiety jangled the nerves along his spine.
Teddi interrupted his burgeoning anxiety. "Since when are you the top gun around here?"
"You and Dex both have health issues, so . . . that leaves me."
"I'm the agent in charge, and I'm pulling rank," she retorted. "I'll nose around."
Jackson knew he wasn't going to win this argument. "Suit yourself, but if you come to your senses, I'll be inside." His torment accelerated. How could he search for a possible bomb and participate in the meeting at the same time?
"Now, children," Dex chided them, "stop arguing so we can get on with the damn meeting. The sooner we grab lunch and talk monsters, the sooner I can get back to the motel and take some more of that heavenly pain medicine."
Jackson lent Dex a hand during their lengthy hike to the Chinese restaurant.
"If you need some back-up, just holler," Jackson submitted, and then they disappeared inside the restaurant.
Teddi loitered near the entrance where she could scrutinize the incoming patrons. Deep down, she considered this a waste of time. A little bird in her mind chirped that everything here was perfectly safe. So what was Jackson so friggin' worried about?
Maybe she should kill that lying bird.
Dr. Jillian "Jilly" Newton earned her doctorate in paleontology from Florida State University. The petite, forty-one-year-old brunette was younger than Dex expected, and a helluva lot prettier, too. Her presence inspired a burst of energy, and he smiled as he shook her hand.
"Now what's a pretty lady like you doin' diggin' up old fossils like me."
She flashed him a sardonic smile. "We're not in a pickup bar, Sheriff. Save your lines for someone who's in the market."
"What market's that?" Dex asked, taken aback by her ill-mannered candor.
"The meat market," she replied stiffly, and sat. "And you may address me as Dr. Newton."
John Redfeather and Jackson exchanged eye rolls, shook hands, and sat opposite each other at the table. Dex sat down on his chair heavily, his spirit deflated. His spurt of energy was spent.
Jackson paid little attention to the dinosaur chatter; instead, he walked the interior and searched for exposed wiring or other suspicious objects. The kitchen was his next stop. His gaze grazed the television above the bar, and he nearly yelled out. Teddi McCoy's face filled the entire screen!
He rushed to the bar. "Can you turn up the volume?" he asked the bartender.
The redheaded college coed nodded and hit a button on the remote.
". . . and if you see this woman, call the police or the FBI immediately. Don't try to apprehend her yourself, because she's believed to be armed and dangerous. Again, FBI Agent Lance Robinson was murdered at Holy Cross Hospital last evening, and Special Agent Teddi McCoy is a prime suspect." A crime-line phone number scrolled across the screen. "On the weather scene, Jerry's got more bad news about a tropical depression brewing in the Caribbean. We'll be right back for his complete update."
"I saw her," a voice behind Jackson exclaimed.
Jackson whirled on the voice. It belonged to a college student busboy.
"You saw this woman? When?"
"Who are you, buddy?"
Jackson flashed his FBI ID.
"Big-time creds," the young man said. "When I took the trash out back to the Dumpster last night, that lady was, like, standing on her tiptoes and stuffing something into the restaurant's vent opening."
"Did you see what it was?"
"Nah, it was too dark. But I remember that she saw me watching her, but she, like, just kept doing what she was doing, man."
"Why didn't you stop her or ask her to leave?"
"'Cause she, like, had a gun tucked in her belt, and since I wasn't in the mood to get shot at, I didn't bug her."
"Why didn't you tell us about her last night?" the bartender demanded.
"Hell, I forgot all about it, Terri. That was about the time that that old guy choked on some Chinese noodles and, like, nearly died."
The bartender nodded. "Yeah, I remember. Close call."
The busboy studied Jackson. "So what's the big deal? She didn't hurt anybody here."
Jackson ignored the question and checked his watch. Eleven thirty-five. If Teddi did arm a timed explosive, her instructions would've been to set the detonation timer ten or twelve minutes later than Dex's scheduled appointment to be certain the targets were inside the restaurant when the bomb exploded. "Get everyone out of here NOW!" he screamed at the bartender.
Dex's head jerked around and caught the panic pinching Jackson's face. The sheriff didn't waste any time; he threw his chair back, leaned over the table, and practically dragged Jilly Newton outside. John was perplexed by his friend's actions until he heard a woman's voice on the PA requesting that everyone exit the restaurant immediately in an orderly fashion. He ran after Dex and Jilly.
Jilly Newton unsuccessfully tried to twist out of Dex's grip, but his hand was locked on her forearm like a vise. Outside, he pulled the struggling professor toward his car.
Dex glanced over his shoulder and searched for Jackson, but he wasn't in sight. Now where in tarnation had the damn fool got to?
Before they reached the car, a tremendous explosion rocked the parking lot and hurled them to the pavement.
Jackson pushed through panicked kitchen staff and sprinted out the back door. He froze when he saw Teddi inspecting the vent!
"Get away from there!" he shouted, and dashed toward her.
She planted her hands on her hips. "I just disabled the timer and detonator," she announced defiantly.
"Get away!"
Her forehead wrinkled in bewilderment. "What's the matter with you, Jackson? I told you I disabled . . ."
Teddi didn't have a chance to finish her statement. Jackson's arm ensnared her waist and snatched her off the ground on the dead run. They made an immediate U-turn toward several blue Dumpsters fifty feet away. Teddi shouted and Jackson panted as they ran to the closest Dumpster. Despite her protestations, he heaved her over the lip and into the cavernous space below. Jackson flew over the top edge and slammed the lid down over them.
Seconds later, a tremendous blast shuddered the ground like an earthquake, and the shock waves launched the Dumpster into the air. The awkward projectile crash-landed thirty feet away on its side with a resonating metallic thud and skidded another twenty feet before it slammed to a stop against a UPS delivery truck. Teddi and Jackson tumbled inside like hopper lotto balls, but racked up bruises instead of winning numbers.
The lid clattered open, and the dazed pair rolled out, groaning from the wild ride.
"But I disabled the bomb," Teddi insisted, gently massaging assorted aches.
"One bomb," Jackson countered, standing precariously. His balance was momentarily out of whack. He realized that Voodoo Man would most likely have back-ups --- just in case Teddi failed her mission.
"There were more?" she moaned absently. "I only recalled one."
"Recalled?"
"Yeah. When I wandered behind the restaurant a little while ago, a shred of memory hit me like a ton of bricks. I saw myself back there last night shoving something into that vent. When I checked it out, I saw a bomb and disarmed it --- or thought I did." Teddi glanced at the devastated pile of rubble that had been P.F. Chang's and began crying.
Jackson crouched beside her and enveloped her quivering form in his arms.
"I'm responsible for that, aren't I?" she cried.
"No, Teddi, you weren't yourself when you planted those bombs. Our mysterious Voodoo Man's responsible," he said soothingly, as he stared at the smoking rubble. Voodoo Man was also no doubt behind the warrant for Teddi's arrest for the murder of FBI Agent Lance Robinson. The bastard knew there was more than one way to skin a cat. Since his previous schemes hadn't eliminated Teddi, he'd obviously decided to let the cops do his dirty work. By the time the lawyers, judge, and jury finally sorted the facts from the red herrings in Teddi's case, Voodoo Man would've completed his ritual and been what? Untouchable? Invulnerable? Jackson shivered.
"I want to arrest that fucker more than ever now," Teddi sobbed.
"We will," he vowed, but first he needed to get her away from there before the cops arrived and busted her.
"What I'd really like to do . . ." She paused to dry her eyes and blow her nose.
Jackson helped her to her feet. "Yes?" he asked softly.
"I'd really like to . . . to feed the bastard to the sea monster and fuck the arrest!"
"Get off me, you big oaf!" Jilly Newton groaned with an airless voice. During the explosion, Dex had landed atop her and was crushing her lungs.
Dex rolled off and, with considerable effort, managed to sit. After Jilly caught her breath, she noticed that there were blood blotches staining the back of his shirt. Her furious frown dissolved to forgiving concern.
"Sheriff, you're bleeding," she exclaimed, and scooted beside him. "Let me see."
"I took a few brick chips is all," he said, making light of his injury. The truth was, they stung like a son-of-a-bitch, but he wasn't about to admit that to Miss Snooty.
"Now just hush and let me take a peek," she instructed, and yanked up his untucked shirttail. She'd seen worse, but his back was peppered with deep, raw wounds. "We need to get you to a doctor."
Dex grimaced. He didn't much like doctors, and now Fossil Woman was suggesting that he see one for the third time this month. Just who did she think she was, anyway? His bleepin' mother, rest her soul?
John Redfeather joined them. "Hey, Dex, you okay?"
Before Dex could reply, his cell phone rang. His wounds complained and stiffly prevented him from reaching around for it.
"Could you get that, John? I'm in a bit of a bind here," Dex requested sheepishly.
John glanced at Dex's bleeding back and swallowed back breakfast. "Sure, Dex." He slipped the cell phone out of the leather belt clip. "Yeah."
"Dex?"
John recognized Jackson's voice. "Hi, Jackson. It's John."
"Where's Dex?"
"He's sitting right here, but he's got some nasty-looking wounds on his back."
"Listen, John, we don't have time to chat. Get Dex into his car now and drive around back. Teddi and I will meet you. Step on it!"
John slipped the cell into his pocket. "It was Jackson. He says we gotta move now, folks."
Jilly and John lifted Dex to his feet.
"What's the damn hurry?" Dex complained.
"Jackson didn't say, but he was adamant about the fast part."
"Sounds just like Jackson." Dex frowned, but his eyes smiled. "Always in a friggin' rush. I guess we'd better git a move on."
"I'm going with you," Jilly stated firmly.
"But . . ." Dex started to object.
"No but's, Sheriff. I wouldn't miss this for the world. I don't see much action locked away inside the campus labs."
"But you don't how dangerous this could be," Dex told her.
John arched his brows. "Hey, just how dangerous is it, Dex? I didn't sign on for stuff like exploding restaurants." He folded Dex and eased him into the patrol car.
Sirens sang in the distance.
"I'll fill you in after we pick up Jackson and Teddi."
"That's a cop-out, Dex."
Dex grinned. "Yeah, I guess it is."
They all gathered in Teddi's motel room. She and Jilly attended to Dex's wounds with the first aid kit John found in the patrol car trunk. Jackson phoned Charlie Simmons from the balcony where Dex's yelps couldn't be heard, but Charlie was in a White House meeting with President Hanover. Jackson asked his secretary to have Charlie return his call as soon as possible. It was an emergency.
Afterward, Teddi and Jilly ordered the men up to Jackson's room so they could freshen up. An hour later, the two women entered Jackson's room. Teddi appeared revitalized.
"So, what happens next?" John asked apprehensively.
"We see if Dr. Newton can shed some light on that monster of ours," Dex replied.
"Please, Sheriff, call me Jilly," she said kindly.
"And make mine Dex," he responded, befuddled by her affable tone.
"I will." Jilly retrieved John's photos from her scuffed black leather briefcase. "I studied these cave drawings and did some research on the creature, and I came to an undeniable conclusion. The animal depicted on the cave wall is a mosasaur."
"A what?" Jackson queried.
"A prehistoric lepidosaur that lived during the Cretaceous Period and dominated the oceans during Upper Cretaceous Period."
Dex regarded Jilly quizzically and held out his hands. "Whoa, hold on a minute there! I didn't understand a blamed word you said."
"Sorry. I sometimes forget to break information into layman's terms." She hesitated. "Try this on for size, folks. The mosasaur was the unchallenged ruler of the oceans back then. You might say it was . . . the Tyrannosaurus rex of the seas."
The school of tarpon, swimming forty miles south of Pascagoula, Mississippi, surfaced frequently. Their huge silver scales dully reflected the pinkish-gray dawn light, as they noisily frolicked and gulped air into their swim bladders. They, too, skirted their usual feeding grounds contaminated by the red tide. The tarpons were forced to venture out into deeper and more dangerous waters.
They were mostly adults, since the majority of their young had perished from starvation and the toxic red tide. These adult survivors desperately sought a cache of untainted small fish and crabs, but the water was still too deep. Their destination was the cleaner and more well-stocked Louisiana coastline.
None of the physically weakened tarpons spotted the massive hammerhead shark cruising just below the surface fifty yards behind them. The predator was also famished and had been stalking them for an hour, gradually moving closer to attack range. It didn't want to scatter them by closing too soon.
The freakish-looking shark was named for its extraordinary mallet-shaped head; an eye was centered at each end. They were swift, active predators that maneuvered easily, making them efficient hunters. This rogue hunter was nineteen feet long and the unchallenged neighborhood bully in this part of the Gulf for many years.
When the tarpons surfaced again, the shark closed to within fifteen yards. The perfect attack distance. It was time.
The hammerhead surged forward while its targets rolled and splashed on the surface. But, in its haste to feed, it didn't sense a larger, fiercer predator lurking in the depths below the tarpons.
Joe Carter was a Pentagon intelligence lifer who had successfully deciphered enemy codes during World War II, the Korean War, and Vietnam. After the advent of supercomputers, he was transferred to the Satellite Intelligence Department where he spent his ten-hour shifts watching a bank of monitors. He was bored stiff, but he decided not to request a transfer. At his age, that would be interpreted as discontent, and discontented employees would be handed a gold watch and forced into retirement. He wanted to avoid that at all costs. Being shackled to his termagant wife 24/7 would drive him to the nuthouse. So he stuck with his new career, holed up in the bowels of the Pentagon, and he would watch those monitors until he stroked out or died of boredom.
This was his second day of scanning the satellite shots of the northern Gulf of Mexico. He was given just enough information to whet his curiosity. Report any sightings of a large sea animal.
Large? How large was large? A whale shark? Orca? Tarpon?
Joe stifled a yawn as his bloodshot eyes continually shifted from monitor to monitor. He sipped his Styrofoam cup of steaming coffee and absently smoothed a colic in his thinning gray hair. What he couldn't comprehend was why the brass upstairs would authorize the considerable expense of repositioning a defense spy satellite for a fishing expedition. There had to be more to this assignment than they were willing to disclose. Perhaps they were hunting a terrorist boat or even a submarine. He smiled. Yeah, that had to be it.
Suddenly, he stiffened and gawked at the scene unfolding on monitor seven.
"Jesus H. Christ! Mel, take a look at this!" he shouted. Coffee splashed over the cup lip and burnt his hand, but it barely registered in his brain.
Joe's African-American co-worker, Mel Daily, gladly abandoned his station and peered over Joe's shoulder.
"What the hell is that thing?" Mel exclaimed.
They watched in amazement as the Mosasaur burst through the surface like a submarine-launched Harpoon cruise missile and closed its massive jaws over a hammerhead shark. The frothy Gulf roiled around them.
"Zoom in! Zoom in before we lose the fucker," Mel demanded.
Joe fidgeted with the console controls, and the monstrous head grew larger.
"Jesus, man, what is that thing?" Mel asked.
"Hell if I know, but look what it's got in its mouth!"
Mel moved closer to the screen. "Zoom in closer. Whatever it is, it sure is ugleee."
"It's a hammerhead shark . . . about twenty feet long," Joe guessed. "Look at the way it's trying to escape the bigger predator's mouth."
"Yeah, but it ain't working, man. The big fucker's got it good."
They watched as the mouth closed ever tighter over the hammerhead's thick frame, crushing it until it finally ceased struggling. They both sank into the crimson waters.
Joe picked up the red phone on his left.
"Shit, man, who you callin' on that phone?" Mel asked. "Fish and Game?"
Joe laughed, and his hand trembled excitedly as he dialed General Waring's office extension. Finally, some action!
General Waring descended to Pentagon sublevel four to view the digitally recorded incident. He took his three assistants with him. He referred to them as Larry, Curly, and Mo. Actually, the threesome weren't that incompetent, especially when he was absent from Washington. Then they could focus on their duties instead of kissing his ass.
Waring knew old Joe Carter well. He had been a damned good cryptologist at one time, but those times had changed and supercomputers had rendered him obsolete. Joe should've retired then, but Waring didn't force the issue. He was acquainted with the poor guy's wife.
Joe replayed the recorded incident over and over for Waring and his silent entourage. Mel kept a prying eye glued to his co-worker's station and one to his video assignment, while Joe kept his mouth shut and just manipulated the controls. Waring finally broke the silence.
"How big would you guess that monster is, Joe?"
"Well, when I saw this live, I judged the hammerhead to be about twenty feet long. It was a big one, that's for sure."
"And?"
Joe's mind whirled. He wasn't used to producing intelligence data under such scrutiny.
"My guess, and of course it's just a guess, because we couldn't see much of the creature's body . . . most of it was underwater . . ."
Waring nodded understandingly.
He generated some saliva to lubricate his dry mouth. "I figure the predator's somewhere close to fifty feet long."
Waring appeared incredulous. "Really? That long?"
Joe exhaled. "Or longer."
One of Waring's assistants stepped forward. "Could we see the wide view again, Joe?"
Joe looked askance to the general, and he nodded his approval.
After Joe backed out of the zoom picture, the assistant pointed at a small white object close to the incident. "Can you zoom in there?"
"No problem," Joe replied. He chastised himself for not noticing the object before. He and Mel had been too intent on viewing the sea monster in action. Now he wished he'd done a more complete analysis before he'd called Waring.
"It looks like a boat," Waring commented.
"Not just any boat," the assistant said. "Look at the equipment in the stern and those orange markers surrounding it. It's a dive boat and looks to be a forty-five footer."
"Dive boat?" Waring asked pensively. "How many people do one of those things carry?"
"I'd say about a dozen divers. The captains of those commercial operations usually take out as many scuba-diving tourists as they can squeeze in." He turned to Joe. "Can you get closer so we can make out the name of the boat?"
"I'll try, but we might have perspective issues." Joe fiddled with the knobs until they could accurately read the soda can labels near the stern, but the satellite's camera angle prevented them from viewing the boat's name. Joe maneuvered the satellite camera to the license identification on the port side.
Waring appeared worried. "How far is that boat from the shark incident?"
"I can tell you exactly, sir," Joe replied. He did some more fiddling. "Six point three miles northwest of the incident locale."
While Joe answered Waring, monitor five displayed the live northern Gulf satellite feed. It displayed a close-up of a bearded man wearing a rumpled fishing hat and stepping from the boat's cabin. He placed a beer can to his lips and threw back his head; his Adam's apple bobbed several times. They could make out a thin trickle of the amber fluid dribble over his chin onto his tee shirt. There was no business identification on the shirt. It simply read: "Farting is a Gas."
"Hey, check out monitor five!" Mel shouted.
Joe and Waring shifted their gazes to the scraggly man stretching on the deck. Suddenly, he ceased in mid-stretch and stared wide-eyed to his left.
"Move out to a wide angle!" Waring hissed at Mel.
Mel quickly obliged, and the wide angle revealed the source of the man's terror. Joe wrung his hands, as the other four men simply held their breath.
A monstrous silhouette, cruising just beneath the rolling aquamarine surface, was headed directly toward the dive boat. It was less than a half-mile away.
Waring snatched the red phone receiver from its cradle, rapidly punched in a number, and spoke urgently to a high-ranking subordinate. When he finished, he looked anxiously at the others.
"I've scrambled an entire sea-and-air-rescue team and a fighter-jet squadron to take out that fucking sea monster. We can only pray that they arrive in time."
"Fat chance," Mel muttered beneath his breath, both eyes glued to monitor number five.
"So what's a mosasaur doing here in Florida?" Teddi asked Jilly. "And especially now."
"Good question," the professor responded. "I'm afraid I'm as much in the dark about that as you all are."
"So if it's a sea creature, then how did it survive all those days in the freshwater Glades?" Jackson posed.
"Oh, that I can answer," she replied. "Mosasaurs populated freshwater rivers toward the end of their reign, but preferred the larger ocean food supplies."
"But the water's so shallow in the Everglades. Wouldn't the damn fish've died out there by now?" Dex queried.
Jilly laughed. "First, the mosasaur isn't a fish. It's a giant marine reptile that breathes air like you and me. Its mouth is shaped similarly to an alligator, but it's most closely related to the monitor lizards of Africa and Asia. Mosasaurs are also linked to snakes in respect to their skull structure and body locomotion.
"Like certain constrictors, the mosasaur can unhinge its jaw, which allows it to swallow sizeable prey. Its teeth are round in cross-section and used to seize and crush its prey. There are an additional two rows of pterygoid teeth that hold the prey while it's being swallowed."
"So they aren't dinosaurs," Jackson confirmed.
"Correct. They're more like serpentine marine lizards."
"With a tail like a huge eel," Jackson added.
"Good observation," Jilly responded. "Mosasaur tails undulate side-to-side like a conger eel's tail."
"If they're related to monitors, then why don't mosasaurs have legs?" Dex wondered.
"They do --- in a way. By studying their fossils --- and they are common throughout the world --- it appears that their legs gradually evolved into shorter-boned paddles. They also developed a tail fin to assist in movement. But, their earliest ancestors would go into the ocean and hunt for food by day and return to the safety of land by night. Of course, they're mainly theories --- nobody's ever studied a live mosasaur."
"By the size of the one I saw on the television news, it wouldn't have to fear any creature," Jackson exclaimed.
Jilly smiled. "That's because the one we're dealing with now is a giant mosasaur, also referred to as a Hainosaurus. Fossils have been found as large as fifty feet! That's not to say there weren't some that were even longer."
"Well, our sea monster is definitely a Hainosaurus," Jackson agreed.
The others nodded their accord.
"What did they eat?" Teddi asked.
"Anything they wanted!" John joked.
Everyone laughed loudly, relieving some of the tension suffusing the room.
"Actually," Jilly began, after the room quieted again, "they fed on ammonites, birds, and turtles."
Dex was incredulous. "Those big bad monsters ate that sissy stuff!"
"I'm not kidding, but the larger ones did feed on sharks and plesiosaurs from time to time," she replied. "However, the mosasaurs weren't immune to attacks from other sea creatures. For instance, one fossil was found with shark bites in its spine. Although they were powerful swimmers, they weren't real fast in the long haul, but a mosasaur could outrun its enemies with short bursts of speed. It didn't need to very often."
"Musta been some kinda kick-ass enemy to worry a mosasaur," Dex interjected.
"Well, let's see. There were the megaladons for one --- the colossal ancestors of the great white sharks. A typical meg was sixty to a hundred feet long and weighed in at least fifty thousand pounds."
"Holy shit!" Jackson cried out.
"But there weren't as many megs back then as there were mosasaurs," Jilly added.
"So how do we kill it?" Dex asked.
Jilly's eyes dropped. Clearly, she hadn't thought of that. Being a scientist, she preferred to capture and study it. But realistically, she realized that it would be nearly impossible to take one alive.
"That's the military's problem," she snapped.
"Sensitive subject," John noted.
"Yes, it is," she retorted. "A marine reptile that we thought was extinct for millions of years suddenly shows up, and all we can think about is destroying it."
"For our own protection," John argued.
"Protection? You mean protect our precious beach tourists."
"Yeah, there's that," John said quietly, preferring not to aggravate her further.
"Which brings us around to why this mosasaur has been feeding on people," Jackson said diplomatically, effectively ending the awkward disagreement.
"I think Bo Swinson was responsible for that," Teddi surmised. "You know, feeding it those women."
"I agree," Jackson said. "Since it's tasted human flesh, it seems to have added us to its menu."
"And there's nothing we can do about that now," Jilly said sadly.
"Why in tarnation did it leave the grotto, then? I mean, it was fillin' its belly on a human buffet down there."
Jackson paced the small area at the foot of the bed. "And that brings us to the big-money question: where's it headed?"
"It certainly seems to have a pretty fair idea, the way it skedaddled out of the Everglades into the Gulf," Dex commented.
"Yeah, it certainly appears that way," Jackson grunted.
Suddenly, hallway screams broke their reverie. Jackson rushed to the door and poked his head outside. He hailed the closest woman.
"What's going on?" he demanded.
The woman was breathless with excitement. "Turn on the Fox channel --- quick! They're showing a real sea monster killing people --- live!"
Teddi switched on the room television and swiftly located the Fox channel. They were sickened by what they saw.
A male reporter spoke ardently. ". . . unbelievable! Again, if you just joined us, we're hovering above the Gulf of Mexico off the Mississippi coast in our helicopter, where some kind of prehistoric sea creature has attacked and eaten several unidentified divers. Repeat, this is not a B-movie. This is actually happening . . .
"Wait! Hold on! We've just been ordered to leave the vicinity. Can you believe this! What we're hearing from the military authorities is that a squadron of jet fighters is on its way here to destroy the monster. Repeat, we've just received an order to . . ."
Jackson switched off the television.
"Why'd you do that!" Teddi objected.
He stared at the blank screen. "Because I have a damn good idea where the mosasaur's heading."
Dex leaned forward in his chair. "Where?"
The others eagerly awaited his answer.
He turned. "My place. In the Bayou."
News manager and former anchor, Bryan Harding of the New Orleans Fox affiliate, snapped his cell phone shut and clapped his hands in joy. His paid military informant had finally earned his keep on the station payroll. And how! Bryan now had exclusive access to a top-secret military search-and-rescue operation in the Gulf of Mexico just east of New Orleans! Sounded like a national headline news scoop to him. And of course he, Bryan Harding, would receive the lion's share of accolades.
He phoned the airport, instructed the station pilot to fuel the weather helicopter and complete his pre-flight check, and then read him the destination coordinates. Next, Bryan located his top cameraman, Jason Levy, in the lunchroom and directed him to pack his gear for a major assignment. Levy shot him a shit-eating grin and jogged toward the equipment room.
Within thirty minutes, the news chopper was in the air and heading east over the Gulf. The trip to the incident locale seemed an eternity. Bryan felt like a sugar-buzzed kid waiting for Christmas dawn, but his Christmas morning had arrived early!
He opened his briefcase and retrieved the compact mirror that never left his side. He slicked back his mud-brown hair, wet his bushy eyebrows until they laid flat, applied a light coat of powder to reduce camera glare, and practiced his disaster-scene expression. Perfect! He carefully returned the mirror to the briefcase and practiced his vocal calisthenics.
Then Bryan saw it and nearly emptied his bowels. Halleluiah! This wasn't the aftermath of a disaster . . . it was one in the making! Some huge prehistoric-looking sea serpent was eating divers like popcorn! Halleluiah! What a story!
Levy switched on the camera, and Jason immediately initiated the live feed to their New Orleans facility. From there, the feed would be forwarded to the national boys. Bryan Harding. Live, nationwide. What a thrill! So what if a few people had to be devoured to advance his career? Shit happened.
Bryan glanced down at the carnage. The water around the dive boat was like red Jell-O. There were no floating body parts. The monster was a tidy eater.
He cleared his throat and narrated the horrible news phenomenon in his deepest voice. His tone was somber, incredulous. His expression sad, but professionally aloof.
"How in the hell did Fox News get hold of this story?" President Hanover bellowed into the phone at General Waring. "You're goddamn right there's a leak somewhere. Find it and plug it! And while you're at it, kill that fucking sea serpent! This doesn't look good, General. People are going ape-shit out there. The White House switchboard is flooded with frightened callers. Put an end to this, Waring, or pack your bags." Hanover slammed down the receiver and buried his stressed face in his hands. What a monumental fuck-up!
The mosasaur exploded toward the divers with a tremendous surge. Humans were its favorite food. Mosasaur filet mignon. Its prey swam at a shallow depth of forty feet and bunched together. The mosasaur continued its feeding frenzy, snapping its jaws wildly; it swallowed the small prey easily, which quickly cleared its mouth for another.
There were fourteen divers in all, and by the time the Fox News helicopter arrived, there were only six divers left alive. One of them escaped the mosasaur, surfaced, and rapidly scaled the chrome ladder to the deck. The young woman collapsed on the teak planking, curled into a fetal position, and sobbed hysterically.
Another diver, Craig Knisely, hugged the large twin propeller shafts and fervently prayed that the monster wouldn't see him. He closed his eyes, unable to witness any more grisly deaths. Safety lurked above him, but his hands were welded to the shafts. If his oxygen in the tank ran out, so be it. He deemed drowning a far more merciful way to die than being gobbled alive by that . . . thing!
But it was not to be. The mosasaur plucked Craig's squirming form from the shafts in a single pass and swallowed him whole, tank and all. He was completely conscious as he was forced into the creature's gullet and the powerful acid dissolved his flesh like tissue.
The mosasaur's immense tail thrashed back and forth as it darted from one victim to another, stirring whirlpools of bloody foam. A bull shark was drawn to the blood feast, but the mosasaur curtailed the shark's invasion with one tremendously powerful bite. The shark wasn't as tasty as the other prey, but it helped sate its gnawing hunger.
The mosasaur frantically hunted for more prey, but there were none left. It paused. Loud sounds drifted down from above. Familiar sounds heard in the grotto lake.
It headed for the surface.
Two Coast Guard Sikorsky helicopters hovered above the boat, and one lowered a harness for the hysterical woman. When the harness dropped on the deck, the woman crawled to it and managed to slip an arm into a loop. As she reached toward the other loop with her free arm, a man burst from the boat's cabin, shoved her aside, and slipped into the harness. The angry winch operator had no choice but to pull the asshole to safety. He would send it back down for the woman as soon as he could.
The man swung out over the water as the winch began reeling him skyward. When he was twenty feet and climbing, a shadowy behemoth burst from the waves and swallowed him and the steel cable like a crappie striking a wriggling worm. The man's screams died in the mosasaur's throat.
The giant marine reptile fell back toward the gulf, pulling the helicopter down with it! The massive machine pitched toward the surface and plunged downward at a steep angle. Its large rotors sliced the water and the stern of the dive boat, screeching to an abrupt halt. The large chopper disappeared quickly into the steaming vortex. The entire crew was lost.
"Jesus, did you see that?" Jason Levy shouted at Bryan.
Bryan acknowledged his cameraman's outburst like one would a child's, and then returned to his frenetic narration.
"The second Coast Guard helicopter has backed off, obviously weighing the risk of attempting another rescue. Meanwhile, that woman's life is at stake. As you can see, water from the stern breach is flooding the deck. It's almost reached the woman's feet, but she appears to be too paralyzed with fear to move. Is there nothing anyone can do for her? Is our own Coast Guard going to leave her for dead?"
Levy shot Bryan a withering glance that all but said, Why don't we try to save her, you pompous asshole?
The other Coast Guard helicopter swooped low over the boat, and a booming amplified voice ordered her to move to safety atop the cabin. She glanced up, tears blurring her vision, but she remained stationary.
Rolling whitecaps surged over the stern to her feet, and the young woman pulled them back as if boiling water had scalded them. The flood level continued to climb until it burbled over her curled legs and torso.
"The nation breathlessly waits to see if this frightened young lady will find the courage to climb to safety," Bryan continued. "Meanwhile, the deadly sea serpent continues to prowl below the surface of these ghastly waters, obviously searching for yet more victims. Will it come after the woman in the boat? Let's pray that it doesn't."
Jason rolled his eyes at that statement. What a shallow prick. He'd love to see her bite the dust. Higher ratings.
"Again, if you just joined us, we're hovering above the Gulf of Mexico off the Mississippi coast in our helicopter, where some kind of prehistoric sea creature has attacked and eaten several unidentified divers. Repeat, this is not a B-movie. This is actually happening . . .
"Wait! Hold on! We've just been ordered to leave the vicinity. Can you believe this! From what we're hearing from the military authorities, a squadron of jet fighters is on its way here to destroy the monster. Repeat, we've just received an order to . . ."
Suddenly, the woman staggered to her feet and clambered up the ladder. Her feet slipped twice on the wet aluminum surface, and for several heart-wrenching moments, she dangled precariously above the swamped stern. But each time she managed to plant her feet back on the rungs and continue the long climb. Jason Levy held his breath. Even Bryan ceased his incessant chatter.
Finally, when the struggling woman reached the fly bridge, the second Coast Guard helicopter lost no time lowering another harness. She wrapped it around her torso and over her shoulders, and quickly fastened the straps. With a jolting tug, the winch hoisted her off the doomed boat.
As she swung out over the open water, the high-pitched shrieks of four diving jet fighters shattered the tension. The Fox News chopper turned and sped away despite vociferous objections from Bryan Harding.
The mosasaur hungrily watched the second helicopter hover above the boat. It curled its muscular tail for another leap from the Gulf and patiently waited until its next victim dangled above the surface like the previous one. Its patience was ultimately rewarded as the helpless prey glided above the mosasaur's waiting jaws.
Time to attack. Time to feed again!
But before it sprang its coiled tail, it sensed unknown intruders in the area and postponed its planned assault. Again, it waited.
Beyond the wriggling woman, it saw four enemies diving toward it. Although the mosasaur was in a blood-frenzied state, it reluctantly abandoned its meal and sped into the depths just as a series of powerful explosions ripped the surface.
Its retreat was too late.
Concussion waves knocked the mosasaur into an uncontrollable spin, and after it finally slowed, it found itself stunned and sinking helplessly toward the bottom far below.
Without resurfacing for air soon, it would drown.
Its survival instincts failed to rouse its muscles as it continued its inexorable descent toward a dark and icy death.
"We got it!" the squadron leader shouted.
"I copy, Thunderbolt. Good work," the mission control manager droned. He turned to the general seated beside him. "Now we'll order the cutter crew to search the area for evidence of the mosasaur's death. Any other orders, sir?"
General Sincevich nodded. "Arrange for more ships and manpower to facilitate the search. The president wants this incident cleaned up and swept under the proverbial rug as soon as possible --- if not sooner."
"Yes, sir. I'll get right on it."
"President Hanover is counting on it."
Special Agent in Charge Ryan Wilkerson's wintry eyes surveyed the vacant Coral Springs alley as he awaited an important phone call. From him.
He and his men had been totally humiliated out on Demon Key by that hotshot Blackhawk pilot, and because of that, the man's plan had been flushed. Now his shitbag ex-wife and her Psycho Man were busily plotting against him, and he had no way to discover what they were up to, because Jackson had somehow managed to purge the voodoo demon spy from her mind.
Wilkerson's cell phone rang right on time with its annoying warbling chime. He looked down at the glowing caller ID. It was him. He flipped open his phone.
"What's up, boss?" he said.
"Jesus, Ryan, you pull the biggest fuck-up in the history of fuck-ups, and you have the balls to ask me 'what's up'?" the familiar voice growled.
"Okay, okay, but how was I to know that that jack-off LaFevre was going to be escorted by a fully armed Blackhawk?"
"All right, there's nothing we can do about it now," the man conceded. "But, it's imperative that we eliminate the whole fucking bunch within the next twenty-four hours, or they could ruin everything we've worked for all these years."
"I can't waste them in Broward County, though. It'll attract too much major press, and that would be bad --- real bad," Wilkerson concluded.
"You're right. If you exterminate them there, the stupid cops would tie their deaths to our key, and the place would be crawling with pigs who'd prevent us from attaining our objective," the man added.
"You gotta plan, boss?"
"Yeah. Listen good. I'm about to set things in motion for the perfect ambush well away from here."
"Yeah, I know about that one: we were going to let the mosasaur do our dirty work."
"Jesus, Ryan, don't you ever watch the news? The mosasaur's dead."
"Since when?"
"Since early this afternoon."
"Shit."
After Jackson explained that he had a credible hunch that implied that the mosasaur was swimming north to pay him a visit, nobody questioned the validity of his statement. They were learning to trust his instincts. But no one could explain why the mosasaur would do such a thing.
During the stillness, Teddi switched the television back on, while Jackson began packing his duffel bag. They watched the gruesome events unfold in the silent motel room. Their feelings were identical. Those poor people . . . except for that creep who charged out of the cabin and pushed the woman away from the rescue harness to save his own bacon. When the mosasaur erupted from the water and nailed the sucker, they almost cheered. But their exhilaration was short-lived when the Coast Guard helicopter plunged into the Gulf, killing the entire crew.
Jackson's cell phone rang, and all heads turned toward him. He distractedly excused himself from the room and drifted out to the balcony again. The rain continued to fall in a steady drizzle, and he drolly wondered if Orlando would become a coastal city if the rain didn't stop soon.
"LaFevre," he answered curtly.
"Good afternoon, Jackson. This is Charlie Simmons."
"Thanks for returning my call."
"Before you tell me what I can do for you, I'd like to apologize for Special Agent Wilkerson's rude behavior last night. I've spoken to him and suspended him until I can get down there and straighten out that mess," Charlie explained. "We could've lost a good contract agent."
"Thanks, but I can't figure it, either. Why would Wilkerson open fire before securing my identification?"
"That's one of the issues I intend to investigate so it'll never happen again under my watch. Now, Jackson, what can I do for you?"
Jackson quickly related the extraordinary events of the past three days, including the mysterious temple in the grotto beneath Demon Key.
When Jackson finished, Charlie said, "I've got to see this temple of yours when I get down there. Be ready to move as soon as I arrive."
"Definitely, but I'm afraid there's an urgency to all this."
"What do you mean?"
"When the grotto lake rises another quarter of an inch or so, the temple will come to life. That's when we believe that whoever's behind these crimes will show up and conduct some kind of ancient ritual," Jackson clarified.
"You really believe that's true?"
"I do."
"Then I'll be on the next flight to Fort Lauderdale." Charlie disconnected the call.
Jackson should've felt relieved about having his old fishing buddy Charlie joining them at the crime scene, but for some reason, he didn't. Before he could fathom that conundrum, his cell rang again. He turned his back to the muggy breeze and answered it.
"Jackson, it's me, Cole."
"Hey, Cole. How's Zeus?"
Cole hesitated.
"Cole, you there?" Jackson asked anxiously.
"Uh, yeah, I'm here, Jackson, but I'm afraid there's no sign of Zeus."
"What!"
"And I hate to tell you this, but his doghouse has been totaled."
"What kind of idiot would trash a doghouse?"
"You got me, but it's knocked flatter than a pancake."
"And there's no sign of Zeus? No blood? No footprints leading anywhere?"
"Nothing, and I think that's sorta odd, don't you?"
"Extremely. Anything else?" For the first time in his life, Jackson felt like killing someone.
"No. I thought that was bad enough."
"You're right. I'm heading back up there tonight," Jackson informed Cole, even though he was traveling back home that afternoon. Jackson didn't feel he could trust anyone these days.
"Good luck, mon ami. I hope you find Zeus. He was a good old dog."
When Jackson returned to the room, the television was off.
"The mosasaur's dead!" Teddi told Jackson. "Guess we don't have to worry about it anymore."
"Yeah." He yanked the duffel bag off the bed, his murderous rage coursing through his body. "I'm heading out."
"Whoa there, pardner! We've got us a plan, Jackson. You might just want to sit a spell and listen to it." Dex turned to Teddi. "You want to do the honors?"
She smiled. "Sure, Dex. We've decided to split up to maximize our efforts."
Jackson sat on the edge of the bed and placed the duffel bag between his feet. "All right, I'm listening."
"First, Dex and I'll accompany you back home. There's safety in numbers."
"Not always," he responded sullenly.
"But what if your Zeus prophecy is just a ploy to split us up?"
"It's crossed my mind," he replied grimly. "And by the way, Zeus is missing. I just heard from Cole back home."
"I'm so sorry, Jackson," Teddi said quietly.
"Could still be a hoax," Dex said, trying to brighten Jackson's mood.
"Could be." He didn't feel like elucidating about Zeus's flattened doghouse.
"While we're in Louisiana, John and Jilly are going back out to that Everglades cave where he and Dex took those pictures of the drawings. Jilly says that she learned a new excavation technique during her last dig in France that can partially restore damaged images. She and John'll attempt to restore the burnt cave drawings."
"I believe they're crucial to understanding the big picture," Jilly stated emphatically. "It's hard for me to believe that a mosasaur still existed in early Seminole history, and even if it somehow survived like the one we saw murdered today, then I seriously doubt that it would climb on land and destroy an entire Indian village. They aren't built for land travel."
"Well, it sure looks like one trampled the wooden walkway at my house last week, crushing the whole danged thing!" Dex interjected.
"Could be. They might be capable of navigating land for short distances."
"Two hundred feet?" Dex asked.
"Quite possibly, yes."
"One other thing, folks," Dex said, standing. "When Teddi had me pinned down inside that grotto lake, I felt something big brush me. Something so big that it sent me into an ass-over-applecart underwater spin! I almost bought the farm!"
"How big? Bigger than a bread box?" John ribbed his friend.
"Make it bigger than a transit bus, wise guy!"
They sniggered nervously, after witnessing the gruesome diver deaths.
"You're suggesting that there may be another one of those mosasaurs hanging around down there?" Jackson asked.
"Yep."
Jackson faced Jilly. "Well, Doc?"
"I don't exactly know what to say. We scientists don't like going out on a limb without empirical evidence."
"Just go for the gusto, Jilly," Dex prodded.
She took a deep breath. "Okay, I agree with Dex's assessment. It's entirely possible that there are two mosasaurs. A female and a male."
"Which one died this morning?"
"The male, I'd say."
"Why, because he's larger?" Dex asked.
"No, because he was smaller."
There was a collective silence as they tried to imagine just how large a female giant mosasaur might be.
Dex and Teddi snuck in catnaps during the chartered jaunt to the Baton Rouge airport, but they were fully alert for the late-afternoon thrill ride through the bayou rivers and channels leading to Jackson's property. Rotting stumps protruded from the lazy currents and made the channels obstacle courses at times.
Dex declined the invitation to sit up front. He decided to ride behind the windshield, or as he referred to it, "the bug screen."
Jackson maneuvered the sleek green and blue bow-rider past his new dock to an extremely narrow side channel.
"Why didn't you dock back there?" Teddi asked.
"Too conspicuous," he replied tersely.
"You expectin' trouble?" Dex asked.
"Until this investigation's wrapped up, yes."
Reeds, Spanish moss, and wild brambles poked the bow-rider and its passengers as they proceeded slowly into the bayou's checkerboard of shadows and sunlight. To Teddi and Dex, the passage appeared to be a dead-end, but Jackson pressed a remote control button beneath the throttle. A thick tangle of flowering vines slid aside, revealing an unobstructed channel on the other side.
"Slick as snot on a doorknob," Dex remarked.
"When I need a back way into my place, this works fine."
"I should say so."
Teddi wasn't as amazed as Dex, because she'd witnessed some of Jackson's incredible gadgets inside his deceivingly ramshackle home. She absently wondered how many other tricks he had up his sleeve.
After another fifty feet, Teddi quickly ducked as Jackson cut the boat sharply to starboard. They passed beneath a vine-smothered trellis into a hidden boathouse. Even she was impressed this time.
Inside, the walls and overhead timbers were spotless. No spider webs. No cobwebs. Not even a scrape on the foam dock bumpers.
Jackson pressed a button on the floating dock, and the boat rose out of the water.
"Keeps the bottom clean," Jackson remarked, as he stepped out of the boat onto a narrow ramp that sloped down to a steel door.
Dex shook his head and grinned. "Wow!"
The door opened onto a concrete path that split into three directions. Jackson pointed out that one led to his house, another to a storm shelter, and the last one to Zeus's doghouse. He chose the last one, and Dex and Teddi followed. She had a funny feeling about this trip --- ominous and chilling. Death lurked in the muggy, bayou summer air.
Teddi glanced at Jackson. Maybe she'd been hanging with him too much lately and it was affecting her nerves. Maybe it was intuition. But whatever the reason, she pulled her gun, and Dex followed her lead.
Hordes of whining mosquitoes descended on the threesome as if they were walking blood banks. Dex and Teddi swatted at the vicious little insects, while Jackson didn't appear bothered at all. Teddi was tempted to shoot a few.
After what seemed an eternity, the walkway ended at the riverbank behind Jackson's house. Teddi stopped and gawked at the ruined doghouse. The broken and splintered boards looked like a steamroller had run over them. Several times.
They caught up with Jackson, who was intently examining the damage.
Dex pointed to several dark stains on the sandy riverbank. "Blood."
"I saw it," was all that Jackson replied. He continued his inspection without speaking. Suddenly, he knelt beside the bloodstains and gently placed his open palm over them. He closed his eyes, and that was Teddi and Dex's clue to clam up. The psychic was doing his thing.
Most of the mosquitoes finally backed off along the river, and Teddi and Dex only occasionally swiped at the pests. Dex surveyed the meandering river. Several bass swam lazily in the brownish shallows, and a black snake serpentined across the glassy surface. Four black alligators sunned themselves on the opposite bank, and Dex instinctively retreated a step. They were gigantic, and way too close for comfort!
Unlike his previous psychic encounter, Jackson remained tranquil. There were no histrionics or screams. No perspiration. And strangely enough, the mosquitoes stayed clear of him.
Finally, Jackson's eyelids fluttered open. "How long was I out?"
"Twenty minutes. Why?" Teddi replied.
"I just need to know how much time we have left."
"For what?" Dex inquired.
"I'll fill you in later."
"What happened here?" Teddi asked apprehensively. Deep inside, she was hesitant to hear what had happened to poor old Zeus. To hear the gruesome details. But once again, she fell victim to her insatiable curiosity.
"This isn't Zeus's blood," Jackson said, a modest smile curling the corners of his mouth. He grabbed a handful of the blood-soaked sand. "This is chicken blood, not canine blood. And, Zeus wasn't anywhere near here when the doghouse was destroyed."
Teddi frowned. "Then where is he?"
Jackson tossed the sand into the river current and whistled three times. Nothing. He whistled again. In the distance, they heard the faint rustling and cracking of underbrush. The noise grew louder and was followed by a nearby splashing that roused the four gators across the river. They raised their heads at the racket and slid silently into the river toward the noise like scaly torpedoes.
The jowl-flapping and ear-slapping sounds of a dog shaking water from its coat preceded a single deep bark. Suddenly, the black and tan Rottweiler bounded around the river bend and collided with his master. It was a cheerful reunion. Jackson hugged the big dog for several long moments, while Zeus tried to lick the skin from his face.
"Where was he?" Teddi asked, surprised at Jackson's emotional display. Normally he was as cool as a cucumber.
"Hiding somewhere in the swamp. He's had the run of this place for a long time, so I imagine he knows a few good hideouts."
After their joyous reunion, Jackson led his guests up the path to his house. After they were seated comfortably in the living room with glasses brimming with grape juice and vodka, Jackson lit one of his slender cigars and leaned back in his recliner.
Teddi sipped the icy drink. It was better than it sounded.
Dex sat stiffly upright. His back wounds prevented him from assuming his usual comfortable sprawl.
Teddi was the first to speak. "Jackson, what did you mean by that crack about how much time we have left? Left for what?"
Jackson blew a series of perfect smoke rings toward the overhead air handler, which sucked them away as soon as they drifted above his head. He appeared at peace with the world, so his reply was a contradiction.
He yawned. "I'm pissed. Really pissed."
"Well, you don't behave like any pissed-off man I've ever met," Teddi remarked skeptically.
"Who you ticked at, Jackson?" Dex prodded.
More smoke rings. "Myself."
Teddi shook her head. Jackson was certainly a perplexing man. "For what?"
"For allowing us to be suckered into this trip."
Dex and Teddi waited for him to explain. More smoke rings. More calm.
"We've been set up. All of us. And now we're trapped."
"Trapped!" Teddi exclaimed. "Then why are you being so damn cool about it?"
"Because I know something that our gun-toting friends don't."
"They've got guns?" Teddi exclaimed, angry at Jackson's seeming lack of interest in their welfare. "So what is it?"
More smoke rings. He wagged his finger at her. "I'm not going to spoil the surprise."
"Ooh! You're impossible!" she ranted.
Dex's face was granite. "So we're just gonna wait here like sittin' ducks. Is that the gist of your plan?"
He nodded. "That's about the size of it, Dex."
"Interesting. Could I have another one of these grape drinks while we're waitin' for your surprise? It's one helluva tasty painkiller."
Jackson grinned. "Absolutely. Have as many as you like."
"Men!" Teddi sighed, but then unexpectedly brightened. "Hell, I may as well get drunk, too."
After mixing more cocktails, Jackson copied the brief history of Demon Key that he'd researched earlier and gave a copy to Teddi and Dex. He asked them to read the document carefully.
"We gonna have a quiz afterward?" Dex cracked.
Teddi elbowed him. "This isn't a joking matter."
"Well, sittin' here all uptight with sphincter cramps ain't goin' to do us no good, either," Dex grumbled, and began studying the two-page history.
Jackson lit another slender Cuban cigar and quietly puffed away until they were finished. "Well?" he asked, when they glanced at him.
"Damn strange," Dex summarized, "and I'm guessin' that we're lookin' at the first recorded history of Demon Key."
"I feel so sorry for that family," Teddi stated sadly.
"Me, too, but that's not the point. It appears that when Edward Loggins purchased the key in 1843, he had no idea what he was getting himself into," Jackson commented.
"Then he moved out in 1849 without even trying to sell the property and reclaim his investment," Teddi added.
"If you'd lost your friggin' wife and four youngsters, you'd most likely want to skedaddle, too!" Dex disagreed.
She nodded broodingly.
"This all you got?" Dex asked, slapping the pages.
Jackson sipped his drink. "Yes, that's it, but it leads me to believe that our temple was alive and well back then."
"Well, I don't see any mention of heavy rains during that time," Dex said.
"I know, and that had me stumped for a while. And then I figured that maybe someone slowly murdered the Loggins family to drive them off the key."
"Interesting idea," Teddi said. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"
Jackson placed his cigar in the ashtray. "That the Swinsons drove them away?"
"Yep. And the Swinsons moved in three years later and took control of the grotto temple. Convenient."
"Sounds more than a coincidence to me," Dex agreed. "But gettin' back to the Loggins family for a minute, if they really were killed by gators, people wouldn't have found them floatin' around the key like that."
"That's exactly what I thought," Jackson said. "Alligators stash their victims for later."
"Then what killed them?" Teddi asked, perplexed.
"We'll never know for sure, but it certainly wasn't a mosasaur. As we saw today, they swallow their victims whole," Jackson answered. "But I believe we've just solved one part of our puzzle."
"Thank God!" Dex broke in. "And then the 1856 rains came along, and a whole bunch of fat women were kidnapped and never seen again."
"Weight-challenged women," Teddi corrected him.
Dex scowled at her. "I ain't politically correct, and never will be!"
Teddi smiled. "Don't we know it."
"So," Jackson began, wanting to get them both back on track, "the mosasaur was around back in 1856."
"And the local Indians weren't," Dex continued. "My late friend, Ike Noonan, told me that after a while, the Indians vamoosed from their villages whenever these heavy rains came. They knew the monster was about to show up and wipe them out."
Jackson sat in his recliner without speaking for several moments.
"A penny for your thoughts," Teddi prompted him.
"This presents us with another quandary. Jilly said that mosasaurs aren't very agile on land. Could something else've destroyed those villages during the heavy rains?"
"That's a humdinger all right," Teddi agreed.
"Shit!" Dex rolled his eyes. "We just tackled one answer, and now we've got another one runnin' loose."
"The only answer that fits the facts is that there's another monster," Jackson offered.
"But what?" Teddi asked.
"A creature conjured from the temple."
"That's pretty farfetched, even for you," Dex grumbled.
Jackson grinned. "I know it sounds ridiculous, but it had to come from someplace around that area."
"Okay, let's give that idea a rest and wade into something else," Teddi said. "How did the Swinsons know about the grotto temple in the first place?"
"Perhaps from Brazilian tribal lore or magic. Their power to foresee events extends to the United States, I can tell you that." Jackson briefly described Yokie's simultaneous vision of the predicted deaths at P.F. Chang's restaurant.
"Incredible," Teddi muttered. "That definitely would explain why the Swinsons wanted that key."
"I'll buy that," Dex agreed.
"So what gave them their power over the mosasaurs?" Teddi continued. "They somehow knew enough to feed them, but there has to be more to that relationship than that."
"Whatever it was, I seem to have inherited it," Jackson lamented. "Something passed between me and Bo Swinson when he died, but I can't figure out what makes it work." He had a pretty good idea, but he wasn't about to share it with the others until he tested his theory tonight.
Dex sighed. "Magic."
"I think Dex's right, Jackson," Teddi said.
"That's a scary thought."
Teddi stared at him. "Yeah."
"Maybe the owners found some magical object on the key that compelled them to feed the mosasaurs and gave them the power over them," Dex proposed.
"Or, it's possible that the grotto temple exerts some kind of force on the owners and the mosasaurs," Teddi chimed in.
Jackson nodded. "I think we're all correct to a point. We just have to connect the dots."
"Let's connect the second one, then. I believe the mosasaurs are somehow involved in the demonic ritual," Teddi theorized. "They're interconnected."
Jackson slapped his fist into his opposite palm. "But how? We've got so much left to learn before more people die around the Everglades."
"Like the Indians did?"
"Exactly."
Jackson fixed another round of drinks and brought out cheese and crackers to munch on. He didn't want anyone getting seriously drunk.
After finishing his snack, Jackson tapped his fingers on the recliner armrest.
"What's eating you now?" Teddi asked.
"I still don't believe that the mosasaurs trampled the Indian villages."
"So that leaves what? A conjured demon?" Teddi asked.
"That puts us back to square one," Dex complained.
Suddenly, Jackson snapped his fingers and leaped from his recliner. "I've got to make a quick phone call. I'll be right back." He headed for the kitchen.
Jackson dialed Jilly Newton's number on his cell. Zeus groaned from the interruption. He'd been peacefully asleep on the cool tile floor. Jackson bent and scratched the dog's head while Jilly's phone rang.
"This is Jilly," she greeted him.
"Hey, it's Jackson. I've got an important question to ask you."
"I'm game. Go ahead."
"Do mosasaurs have orange eyes?"
She laughed. "Certainly not."
"Thanks. Where are you guys?"
"Getting wet on John's dock, that's where! He getting ready to take me out to those cave drawings in his airboat."
Jackson grimaced. The South Florida rain was still falling. It wouldn't be long before the grotto lake rose and covered the dark temple step. They had to hurry! "Good luck and keep us posted," he said, and hung up.
"I will." As she folded her flip phone, she shook her head with amusement. Orange eyes. What a silly question.
Jackson related his brief conversation with Jilly, and Teddi and Dex exchanged glances.
Teddi nodded. "When Swinson kidnapped me, I told you about seeing horrible orange eyes just before I passed out."
"Right, and I saw them in my vision back at the motel, too," Jackson said. He also saw them in Teddi's mind at the hospital.
"What's it all mean?" Dex asked.
"It means whatever crushed the villages wasn't the mosasaur."
Teddi appeared worried. "It was something awful with orange eyes. I remember that. I just didn't get a good look at it." She paused. "But how's this demon connected to the mosasaurs? If we're right about all this, they both show up during the rainy seasons. There's got to be a reason for it."
"Damned if I know." Suddenly, Dex brightened. "You know, I just might have an idea what this other killer was . . . is."
Before he could reveal his speculation, a grating alarm sounded overhead.
"We've got visitors." Jackson leaped up and pressed a wall rocker switch. "Hold that thought, Dex."
As the sun reached the western horizon, Jacques Ledee slept beside his water spaniel, Pepper, along the bayou channel leading to Jackson's property. His cane pole hung over the water, and a wooden bobber floated listlessly ten feet from the riverbank. A loud engine growled in the distance, but his snoring prevented him from noticing. Minutes later, a powerful speedboat roared past, its frothy wake rolling up the bank and over the fisherman and his dog.
Pepper barked at the reckless boaters, as Jacques spit out a mouthful of foul bracken water and angrily watched his pole and bobber drift downstream.
"Dammit!" he swore, and searched for the boat, but it had vanished around the next bend. Water poured out of his pant legs, and there was a puddle in each shoe.
Pepper shook himself dry, spraying an already soaked Jacques.
"Assholes!" he muttered, and picked up his bait and tackle box. With one angry wave of his fist at the bend, he retreated into the brush to find his anchored johnboat. It was time to row home and change into dry clothes.
Jacques wished that he'd gotten the boat's name or identification number so he could report the speeders to the Beaux Bridge police. Oh well. Maybe Jackson LaFevre would have better luck.
John Redfeather coasted toward what passed for an island in the Everglades until the airboat's bow grated on the sand. He shut off the running lights. He and Jilly were soaked to the skin from the ninety-minute trip through the swamp, but it didn't matter. They were both excited to test her newfound chemical process on the blackened drawings.
There was no mantle of leaves covering the trapdoor this time. John zipped open his backpack and handed Jilly a flashlight. He used his own flashlight to locate the rusted steel ring, and then he gave it a tug. The door fell back against a bed of pine needles. She directed her beam down a shaft leading to the limestone cave. She stepped back.
"Looks spookier at night," John agreed, "but it's dark no matter what time we'd go down there."
She nodded.
"Follow me."
He led the way down the wet, slick steps. Jilly glanced around before taking the first step. Lightning flickered in the east like a candle flame in a breeze. Spooky wasn't the word for this. She decided that terrifying best described it.
When they reached the bottom, John pointed down a narrow tunnel. "It's that way."
Jilly nodded. She didn't know whether the cool water or absolute fear quivered her bottom lip, but she sloshed after John anyway. One thing she did know. This wasn't that nice dry dig in France.
The water level reached her shoulders as they entered a cavern. John flashed his beam around so she could get a feel for the circular chamber's size.
"Does the water get any deeper than this?" she asked, fearing the answer.
"Nope. This is it. If you need a hand or start to slip, yell out. I'll only be a couple steps away."
That's comforting. She said, "Thanks. Let's get to work."
"Sure."
They waded across the chamber, and he illuminated the blackened section of Seminole history --- at least, how it related to the monster. Jilly silently studied all the drawings for ten minutes before speaking.
"Looks like your people were afraid of some powerful magic," she noted, pointing at a twelve-foot section of drawings. "And there, just as their story gets interesting, someone obliterated it."
"What about this part with the mosasaur?"
"Can't really tell until we recover the missing section. It would be akin to using someone's quote out of context today."
He nodded.
She pursed her lips and tapped her quivering chin with her forefinger. "It certainly appears as if the mosasaur destroyed the village, but we can't make assumptions. You of all people should know that."
"I haven't actually practiced my paleontology degree yet."
"And you won't until you travel beyond the casino parking lot," she mildly scolded him.
He grinned sheepishly. She had him there. Now, try explaining that to his father and uncle, who operated the casino.
"I'll need the sprayer and canisters three and five," she instructed him.
He unzipped his floating backpack again and pulled out a battery-powered apparatus resembling a small paint sprayer. Next, he fished around inside for the canisters she specified.
Jilly plugged canister three into the bottom of the sprayer and coated the blackened area. John grimaced. The stuff in that canister smelled like turpentine.
"Get out the two masks."
He rummaged around inside the backpack, but he couldn't locate them.
"They're in the blue plastic box."
"Got it."
They donned the masks, and he relaxed. The malodor disappeared.
Fifteen very long minutes later, the black coating dissolved to gray and ran down the wall into the water. Jilly switched canisters and sprayed another chemical over the first. They waited. It was like watching a Polaroid picture progressively develop. The drawings beneath the coatings slowly appeared. Most of the color was faded or absent, but the outlines were recovered intact.
"That stuff's amazing," John exclaimed.
"I was worried that it wouldn't work in this damp atmosphere," she explained, handing him the sprayer and canisters. "If we had more time, I could work on that color a bit."
They shed their masks, and John returned the items to the backpack. He leaned forward and examined his people's newfound history. Jilly edged closer, too, partially because the water was shallower along the wall.
"Oh my goodness!" she gasped. "Do you see that, John?"
"Wow! It's the grotto temple . . . and it's exactly like Dex described it."
She pointed to a monstrous figure. "But he didn't describe that!" she exclaimed.
"Shit the bed!"
Jilly's head turned sharply toward him.
"Sorry, ma'am."
"And don't call me ma'am! Jilly's the name."
"Yes, ma'a . . . Jilly."
She studied the horrible drawings again. "This is what killed your people."
"What is it?"
"I'm not sure, but it's definitely an ancient demon of some kind."
"We've got to get back to town and warn the others! They need to know what they're up against."
A muffled thump echoed along the tunnel behind them.
"What was that?" she asked uneasily
"Wait here. I'll check."
"Not on your life! I'm going with you."
"Suit yourself, but it's probably nothing." John projected poise, but he was a little edgy himself. It didn't sound like thunder. It sounded more like . . . he'd wait till he climbed up the ladder before hitting the panic button.
They retreated through the tunnel as quickly as the slippery floor would allow. When they reached the ladder, John aimed the beam upward. The trapdoor was shut!
He scaled the ladder and pushed up on the old wooden planks, but the trapdoor only opened an inch. Someone had obviously chained and locked the steel ring to the catch.
"We're locked in, Jilly," John called down.
"Shit!"
The wall behind Jackson's recliner slid aside, exposing a single row of color television monitors. Rooftop surveillance cameras continually scanned the house grounds 360 degrees, while two others panned the riverbank and dock. They were all set to infrared in the falling gloom.
Twilight succumbed to night as Jackson checked the screens. He spotted three men scrambling from a speedboat beached around a river bend. They hugged the jungle cover as they headed toward his section of riverbank. Zeus's ears popped erect as he paced the kitchen, sensing danger.
With a sardonic grin, Jackson snatched Bo Swinson's flute-whistle off the kitchen bulletin board and marched to the back door.
"You're not leaving without us," Teddi stated, pulling her Beretta Centurion.
Jackson gestured toward the monitors. "Just watch. I'll be fine." With that, he opened the door and blended into the black foliage.
Dex painfully got to his feet and joined Teddi in front of the monitors. They watched the three men approach the ruined doghouse, and seconds later, an eerie three-note melody punctured the bayou cacophony. Suddenly, all hell broke loose on the river.
Teddi and Dex stared in awe as the river burst to life with a knotted mass of alligators thrashing and bellowing in the black water. The three intruders turned and faced the spectacle, uncertain about how to proceed. Teddi pointed at one of the green images on monitor three.
"That's Ryan! What the hell's he doing here?" she cried out.
"Maybe he caught wind of the doghouse attack and has come to protect us," Dex speculated, although he didn't believe a word of that bullshit.
She wasn't convinced, either. "Maybe."
They saw Jackson appear on the opposite side of the doghouse ruins. The three men detected him in the brightening moonlight, raised their guns, and fired.
"Jesus! Ryan's trying to kill Jackson! There must be some mistake. I've got to stop them!" Teddi dashed out the front door before Dex could stop her.
"Ryan, stop!" she screamed at the top of her lungs. "It's Jackson!" She sprinted down the path leading to the doghouse and broke out of the tangled undergrowth behind the three men. "Ryan, quit shooting!" she yelled breathlessly. "It's Jackson."
One of the shooters pivoted and zeroed in on her with his automatic rifle. It was Ryan! She ducked just as a fusillade of bullets shredded the neighboring saplings and trimmed the vines and brush overhead.
Why was Ryan doing this?
Jackson blew the strange flute-whistle again, and Teddi nervously peered over a ragtop bush. Why wasn't Jackson returning their gunfire? What did he hope to accomplish by blowing that stupid flute-thing?
An enormous shadow erupted between the agitated alligators close to Ryan and the other two hit men, and it landed with a tremendous thud on the riverbank. Two of the men kicked and screamed in its massive jaws, while the third lay crushed beneath its monstrous frame.
The mosasaur! It wasn't dead after all!
Teddi stood and cautiously advanced toward the prehistoric reptile, at once fascinated and petrified. A huge eye followed her approach, but the mosasaur didn't attack her as she knelt beside the bleeding corpse. It was Ryan.
The mosasaur remained still, its paddle feet splayed on each side, and its eel-like tail moving slowly back and forth in the suddenly quiet river like a watery metronome. The mosasaur masticated its prey like a cow lazily chewing its cud. The screams had long ceased, and the men --- or what was left of them --- were no longer visible in its mouth.
Jackson strode up to the mosasaur and placed a hand on its flipper-foot; Teddi gawked in horror. That man's got a death wish! He's finally flipped out --- no pun intended!
The mosasaur merely snorted a greeting, and then all of a sudden, Teddi got it! The owner of that flute was the mosasaur's master. Its food provider. She glanced down at her body. Thankfully, she was too thin for mosasaur food.
Jackson glanced at her. Or was she?
She planned to keep a close eye on Jackson from now on --- in case he got any ideas about kidnapping her.
The mosasaur wriggled backward into the river with the aid of its paddle feet and sank beneath the surface. Jackson strode toward her, and she raised her gun.
"Whoa, what's this all about?" he exclaimed, his hands raised.
"You're the mosasaur's new keeper. Its master," she sputtered.
"Unfortunately, you're right."
"So you're also the thing's food provider, and I don't plan on becoming your first kidnap victim."
Jackson threw his head back and laughed. "So that's what you think, huh?"
"Yeah, I do," she huffed. Her anxiety was displaced by anger at his laughter.
"Look, Teddi, cool it. I'm not like Swinson. I don't live on Demon Key, and I don't subscribe to the rite of feeding perfectly lovely ladies to predators."
"How about fat ones?"
"You mean weight-challenged, don't you?"
"Yeah, yeah, whatever."
"I'm excluding every man, woman, and child as mosasaur food, okay?"
Teddi relaxed, lowered her Beretta, and broke down into tears. She hated herself for the emotional outburst, but she couldn't hold it back. "I can't believe Ryan was in on this," she wept, looking down at his crushed corpse one last time. "He tried to kill me!"
Jackson swept her into his arms and hugged her tightly. After finally shedding enough tears for the bastard who'd made her life miserable and attempted to kill her, Teddi backed away from Jackson's comforting embrace, sniffed a few times, and patted her damp cheeks dry with his proffered handkerchief.
"Thanks," she said softly.
Dex suddenly stepped onto the path behind them, holding his gun. "You didn't need to worry about Ryan, Teddi. I had your back the whole way."
She turned and gave him a peck on the lips. "Thanks."
Dex stared at the ominous river as the mosasaur's ripples settled. "I bet that's what happened to poor Carlos Fuentes that night at my place. Swinson probably used that little flute of yours to lure it out to the dock where it partook of a little Spanish cuisine."
"It must've come into your yard earlier, searching for you," Jackson surmised. "That's most likely how your wooden walkway got trashed."
"And when it didn't find me, Swinson and the mosasaur waited by the dock."
"In the dark, the killer must've thought Carlos was you and sicced the mosasaur on him," Teddi surmised.
Dex sighed and slowly retreated from the dark river. "Poor Carlos."
Teddi squeezed his good arm. "Try not to think about it."
Dex nodded glumly.
Jackson stepped past them. "I'm sorry about Carlos, Dex, I really am, but we've got to get cracking. There's a lot of groundwork to lay before tomorrow night."
"What's happening tomorrow night?" Teddi queried.
"The grotto temple's going to rock and roll."
Jilly shivered in the waist-deep water at the foot of the ladder. She removed her cell from its hip pouch and raised it to John in her trembling hand.
"Here, try my cell," she proposed.
John climbed down the ladder and took her phone. "I don't think there are any cell towers around here. We'd have to be closer to I-75."
"Oh, don't be such a spoilsport. At least give it a try," she urged.
"Sure." He ascended the ladder and poked the cell's blunt antenna through the narrow opening between the trapdoor and the frame. No signal. He tried the other three sides, but the results were identical. "No go," he shouted down.
"Now what?" she asked warily.
"We spend the night."
"Down here in all this water? We'll die of hypothermia," she complained.
"Do you have a better idea?"
Her eyes glazed with tears. "No," she whimpered.
"Then the first thing we should do is turn off our flashlights to conserve the batteries."
The idea repulsed her, but it was logical. It was just that the mere thought of spending the night standing in deep water in complete darkness was akin to torture. Would she still be rational if she survived the night? Would they be rescued, or would they die in this hellhole?
Jilly flicked off her flashlight, gritted her chattering teeth, and attempted to ward off the mental demons that threatened to devour her sanity. She peered up at John and the halo of moonlight illuminating the trapdoor. At the moment, she didn't want to hear anymore of John's ideas.
Then his flashlight went off, and they were cloaked in a dank blackness. Unseen water droplets plunked into the flooded tunnel from the root-bound ceiling. The gusty wind whistled through the sliver of an opening around the trapdoor, and rain pounded the planks like scores of tiny hammers. A scream welled in her throat, but she quickly dammed it.
No sense losing her dignity, too.
"Why are you so blamed positive that the temple hoedown's tomorrow night," Dex asked, after they were safely inside Jackson's house.
Jackson lit another cigar and settled into his recliner. He looked shaken from the experience.
"Because the mosasaur kinda told me so."
Teddi replaced her Beretta in its holster. "Really! Now I've heard everything. A talking reptile."
"It didn't tell me in so many words, but I sensed an urgency to return to the grotto by tomorrow night," he explained, glowering at her. "And if you don't believe me, you can join the crowd of skeptics who seem to surround me wherever I go."
"I'm sorry," she apologized. "It's just that this is all so . . . incredible."
"Amen," Dex added, downing the last of his warm grape juice and vodka.
"It is for me, too. This is the strangest case I've ever worked," Jackson said, puffing smoke rings toward the air handler. He faced Dex. "So let's hear your theory about the orange-eyed killer."
Dex cleared the muggy night air from his throat. "The only clue we have left is that demon statue at the back of the altar. If a mosasaur didn't kill the Indian tribes and destroy their villages, the only murderous-looking monster in the area is that ugly thing."
"But it's made of solid stone," Teddi objected.
"And those altar urns were made of some kinda clay, too, but that didn't stop them from sucking blood outta my hands."
"Point taken," she said, backing off her criticism.
Dex looked at Jackson. "So, what do you think?"
The psychic stifled a yawn. "I think it's time to call it night."
"That's a cop-out if I've ever heard one," Teddi stated harshly. "I thought you said we had a lot of work to do for tomorrow night."
"We do, but we can take care of business in the morning. I'm bushed."
He started to rise from the recliner, but Teddi pushed him back down. "Did you know that Ryan was going to be one of those shooters tonight?" she demanded.
He crushed his cigar tip in the ashtray. "I'm afraid I did."
"Then why didn't you tell me!"
"Because I didn't want you to do something dangerously foolish like you did."
"You couldn't possibly have known . . ."
"But I did, and . . . and I saw Ryan kill you in my Brazil vision, too. Thankfully, I delayed your appearance at the scene, and that changed fate, so to speak. Now if you don't mind . . ." He got up and walked to the short hallway off the dining room. "Dex, you take my bed. It's the room on the right. Teddi, you take the guest room."
"I thought you said this house was built for one."
"Sometimes Charlie spends the night on his fishing trips. Satisfied?"
"I suppose."
"Where are you bunkin', Jackson?" Dex asked.
"On the couch where I can keep one eye on the monitors."
"I thought this was over," Teddi said.
"I don't always see everything, Teddi. Sometimes the psychic world holds back a few surprises."
"He's right, Teddi. We'd better catch some shut-eye. It could be a long night tomorrow," Dex predicted.
"Count on it," Jackson concurred. "Good night."
Teddi's eyelids shot up like runaway shades. She heard an unfamiliar noise, but in her sleepy state, she thought it was a dream at first. There it was again! Goosebumps prickled her skin. A muffled moan. Like a distant wolf howl.
She kicked off the sheet, dropped her legs over the side of the bed, and crept to the bedroom door. She pulled it open a crack and put her ear to the narrow space. The howling moan came again. It was inside! Was it Zeus?
Teddi pulled the door open wide, and despite being naked, she crept into the dimly lit living room. A night-light glowed in the kitchen and faintly lighted her way.
Jackson lay curled on the couch, facedown in his pillow. His leg muscles repeatedly clenched and shivered, and then he groaned.
Jackson was responsible for those awful sounds! He seemed to be in distress. Without considering her nakedness, Teddi rushed to his side and shook him awake. His face jerked up, lathered in sweat, and his eyelids blinked alert. His shivering increased, and she tossed the blanket that he'd kicked to the floor over his body.
"What's the matter?" he whispered urgently.
"You're the matter," she replied. "You were having a bad dream. Your moaning woke me up."
"Sorry." He ran his hand across his face. The perspiration dripped onto his blanket. "I was having a dream."
"Sounded more like a nightmare."
He hugged the blanket to his neck. "I was freezing. And wet. It was dark, and I thought I was alone until I heard a woman groan and a man's hoarse voice respond."
"Let me get you some coffee to warm you up," Teddi suggested.
"Tea, please. It's in the cupboard above the sink."
Teddi stood and made her way around the shadowy objects between her and the kitchen entrance.
"You're naked!" he hissed after her.
She paused and turned. "It's a bad habit. Ryan hated it."
"Ryan was a fool."
"Thanks." She entered the kitchen, tiptoed around a slumbering lump, Zeus, and found the tea. Within minutes, the teakettle was whistling.
Teddi returned with a tray of two mugs of steaming water and a pair of teabags. "Choose your own strength. I'm a coffee person myself."
"Then what are you drinking?" he asked, sitting up.
"Tea."
He laughed.
"When in Rome . . ."
"Yeah." His eyes roamed her attractive curves. "Would you like this blanket?"
"To cover my body?"
"Well, yeah."
"Is it that repulsive?"
"On the contrary, it's magnificent."
"Then, no thanks. Modesty doesn't become me."
"Good." He placed the dripping, spent teabag on the tray.
"So, what do you think your dream meant?"
"Not all dreams have a deeper meaning," he explained, sipping his tea. "I don't know that this one had any significance."
"Trust me, the way you were curled into a ball and sweating like Kobe Bryant, it meant something."
"Are you psychic?"
She chuckled. "Intuitive. I'm FBI, and I say it means something."
"Naked FBI."
"And your meaning?"
"It puts us psychics at a disadvantage."
"Are you going romantic on me?"
"Heavens no."
She blew the steam from her teacup. "Really."
"Well, maybe just a smidge."
"Would you like to continue our conversation in my bed?"
"No."
"How about just going to bed and skipping the conversation?"
"Best idea you've ever had."
"You see, I am intuitive."
Jilly sputtered and coughed herself awake. Her grip on the ladder rung was tenuous, and her hands slipped off. She slid beneath the water, but popped up immediately. John's hand groped for her and nearly poked her eye out.
"Watch it!" she berated him.
"Sorry," he muttered huskily.
She finally composed herself. "Sorry if I bit your head off," she apologized. "This whole sleeping-in-water thing is pissing me off."
"Me, too."
"Couldn't you try and break down the door?"
"You mean break it up?"
"Whatever. You know damn well what I meant, Casino Man."
If Jilly weren't a woman, John would've slugged her by now. She was definitely trying his nerves. "I could give it a shot. Anything's better than standing in this water and trying to sleep." He really wanted to say, "Anything's better than staying down here with such a bitch!" But, of course, he didn't.
"That's the understatement of the year."
He sighed. "Yeah, I guess it is."
John climbed the ladder, gripped the top rung, and slammed his left shoulder into the trapdoor near the hinges. Maybe they would be so rusted that they would easily break apart.
"Oww!" he yelled. He rubbed his throbbing shoulder. "That hurt!"
"Don't be such a baby. Of course it hurt, but you know what they say."
"No," he groaned, but he was sure she'd tell him.
"No pain --- no gain."
"That's easy for you to say."
"You want me to try?" she huffed indignantly.
He didn't bother replying. She could be impossible at times. Most of the time. Instead, he took a deep breath and rammed his shoulder into the center planks this time.
Crrraaack!
"Was that the door?" she shouted hopefully.
"I think it was my collarbone."
"Shit!"
"Good morning," Teddi greeted Jackson. Her voice was husky from her own moans last night.
He embraced her again, their bodies intertwining easily as they had most of the night. They were exhausted, but blissfully satisfied.
"We've got an active day ahead," she managed between kisses.
They reluctantly released each other and rolled out of bed. Teddi headed for the door.
"You might want to slip into something, my dear."
She frowned. "I thought we discussed this last night."
"We did, but we didn't factor Dex into the equation. I heard him rustling out in the kitchen, and it smells like he's found the bacon and eggs."
She grinned. "I think I'll reconsider."
"Good idea."
She opened a dresser drawer, pulled out one of Jackson's dress shirts, shook it open, and slipped into it. "How many buttons should I do?"
"All but one --- the top one."
"That's a lot of modesty," she complained.
"Think Dex."
"All right, Jackson. All but the top two." She left him smiling and shaking his head.
Dex already had their plates ready and waiting by the time they finished showering and dressing. Scrambled eggs and cheese. Pancakes. Bacon doused in maple syrup. Everyone ate hungrily.
"You two are certainly chipper this morning," Dex beamed. "Anything I should know about?"
Jackson and Teddi both said "no" simultaneously, then laughed.
Suddenly, Jackson cried out and clutched his left shoulder.
"What's the matter?" Teddi asked, jumping up. She hoped that he hadn't injured himself during their sexual acrobatics last night.
"I don't know." His eyes glazed over. "I broke my collarbone trying to break up the trapdoor."
"What?" Dex shouted. He shot Teddi a worried look. "What in tarnation is he talkin' about?"
Teddi shrugged.
Jackson's eyes returned to normal. "What happened?"
Dex repeated Jackson's strange muttering.
"Oh God, Jackson, now I know what you meant last night after you awoke from your nightmare," Teddi burst out.
"What?" Jackson exclaimed.
"Something's happened to John and Jilly. They're trapped in that cave in the Everglades. Remember, you were wet and shivering last night, and now your shoulder hurts this morning. And where would you find an old trapdoor?"
Dex snapped his fingers. "At the Everglades cave! I was there."
Jackson studied Teddi's smug expression. "Maybe you are psychic."
"Intuitive," she reminded him.
"She may be on to something," Dex said.
"I'd say so," Jackson agreed.
They finished breakfast with a sense of urgency, topped off the boat's gas tank, and headed back through the bayou toward the Baton Rouge airport. Time seemed to crawl, but they did their best to stay focused on their hastily formed rescue plan.
Teddi shouted over the engine. "Hey, Jackson, you told us that our trip to your place had been a setup. Who's responsible for it?"
"The person behind all this."
"Any ideas?"
"Not at the moment. How about you? You're the intuitive one."
She smiled as the wind whipped her short blond hair into flailing spikes. "I'm recharging the old mental batteries."
He appraised her body. "And those batteries, too?"
She slapped his arm. "Just keep your eyes on the river and your thoughts on South Florida."
Dex ignored them. He was concerned that he might not be able to find his way out to the island cave again. He remembered a whole helluva lot of confusing turns and mangrove breeches before they'd arrived.
But Dex didn't press his memory too hard. He knew if he did, the stress just might wipe his slate clean.
Teddi's cell phone rang as soon as her feet hit the puddled tarmac beside their chartered plane at the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. It was a brief conversation.
"Who was that?" Jackson asked.
"Charlie. He wants to meet me at three for a briefing."
"Does he know about Ryan?" Dex asked her, as they jogged to shelter inside the private hangar.
"No, and I don't want to tell him over the phone."
"Smart girl."
"So it appears that you two will have to go it alone out to the cave," she said, disappointment pinching her face.
"We'll be fine. Let's meet at five back at the motel. We've got a long night ahead of us," Jackson predicted.
"I know. I hope Jilly and John are all right."
"Me, too," Jackson agreed, and kissed her hard.
Dex didn't notice. He was still engrossed in drawing the mental map to the limestone cave, and there were still a few significant gaps.
Dex fired up his sheriff's department airboat, and the large fan slowly revolved behind them.
"I'm not sure I know the way," Dex lamented.
"No problem. I can follow John's psychic trail out there."
Dex scratched his head, not fathoming Jackson's remark.
"It's like following a trail of breadcrumbs," Jackson elucidated.
Dex smiled. "Good . . . I guess."
They slipped on the ear protectors to drown out the engine's roar, and Dex pushed the throttle forward. They were off.
Both men silently prayed that Jilly and John were still alive, and they vowed to arrest those responsible for their friends' predicament.
President Shelton Hanover called General Waring's cell phone and congratulated him on a job well done.
"Did you find proof that the mosasaur's dead?" Hanover asked.
"Not yet, but the Gulf's pretty deep at that spot. We're moving submersibles into the area because our divers can't reach the bottom," Waring responded. "I ordered the Navy to provide me with the irrefutable video evidence you wanted."
"Well, General, it would make a great video bite for tomorrow's six o'clock news," Hanover reminded him. He was always searching for positive news that would reinforce his powerful nationwide and worldwide political clout.
"I understand, sir. We're on it."
"I trust that you are. And, you'll contact me directly as soon as you have that evidence in hand?"
"Absolutely, sir."
"Thanks."
Waring tucked his cell away and stared out over the Gulf from the bridge of the Coast Guard cutter. A sudden notion chilled him.
What if that human-chomping monster was still alive?
Teddi grabbed a quick nap at the motel before meeting Charlie Simmons. She thought it was odd that he had requested a late lunch meeting at a small Chinese restaurant on University Drive in Coral Springs. He was normally a by-the-book manager who would've utilized the available FBI facilities in downtown Fort Lauderdale. Cheap and well equipped. He was a budget curmudgeon.
But in a way, she was glad. Hunger gnawed her stomach, and she still occasionally felt weak from her long coma battle.
Charlie greeted her beneath a dripping flowered canvas portico in front of the Yellow Lotus restaurant. The rain was falling harder here than at the motel.
"There's been a change of plans," he said brusquely. "Ryan Wilkerson's missing."
"Uh, he's not missing, sir." She tried to think of a professional way to announce his death. Something clever, yet somber, to ease the blow. She drew a blank. "He's dead," she said finally, and held her breath for his reaction.
His gray brows shot up. "What's this?"
Relieved that he hadn't exactly popped a blood vessel, she hurriedly described last night's bayou incident, careful not to overlook even the most obscure detail. His eyes bore into hers as she spoke, and Teddi grew increasingly uncomfortable in his presence.
Charlie's cold, business-like countenance had been intimidating until she got to know him better over the years. His face was long and gaunt, with sleepy blue eyes that peered out from droopy lids but amazingly missed nothing. His smile was crooked, his complexion sallow, and his balding head shaved, but his body was the picture of health. He worked out at his athletic club each morning before he arrived at work.
His demeanor was gruff, and his dialogue with his departmental subordinates was acerbic, but he had grown fond of Teddi for some inexplicable reason. She didn't look a gift horse in the mouth. Others within the department accused her of sleeping with him, but the truth was he'd never made a pass at her. If Charlie liked her, so be it. And if it pissed off Ryan, so much the better.
But Ryan was gone now, as well as, it appeared, her favorite-son status with Charlie.
"And you just watched it happen," he said. It wasn't a question. It sounded more like an accusation.
"Like I told you, I tried to stop it, but Ryan nearly shot me for my effort."
"I see."
But did he? thought Teddi.
"I want you to take me out to this Demon Key of yours. I want to see what Ryan might've been up to out there."
Teddi checked her watch. If she took Charlie out to the key, she'd be late for her five o'clock rendezvous with Jackson and Dex.
Teddi stood her ground. "I can't right now. I'm hot on an investigative lead that might close this case, and I have to be back here by five this afternoon."
"Cancel it."
"Sir, you placed me in charge of this investigation, and I intend to see it through," she replied stubbornly. "And besides, it's too dangerous to go out there now."
"Are you afraid that the mosasaur might return?"
"No."
"It won't, you know. It's too far away."
How could he know that? "I can't disclose the reason for my fear at this time, sir, but I promise to include that information in my report when the investigation is concluded."
"I'm afraid that will be impossible."
Teddi folded her arms across her chest. "And why's that?"
Charlie grinned, pulled a gun from his suit coat pocket, and pointed it at her chest. The barrel was outfitted with a silencer.
"You won't close the case, because you'll be dead. Now get into my car and don't raise a fuss. I won't hesitate to shoot you."
"But, why are you doing this, Charlie?" she asked, stalling while she contemplated an escape.
Charlie prodded her in the ribs with the gun. "Get moving." He directed her to a black Crown Victoria's driver's door. "Get in and slide across the seat."
When they were both inside, he handcuffed her wrists behind her.
"What's this all about?" she pried. Escape seemed unlikely now, especially with Jackson and his psychic abilities so far from Coral Springs.
"Why, Teddi, haven't you figured this out yet? I'm losing confidence in your investigative capability."
She tumbled the facts over and over in her mind. Nothing. It was hopeless, unless . . . "You're behind everything: Swinson, the kidnappings, Ryan's death . . ."
"Don't forget Jilly Newton and John Redfeather."
"You killed them, too?"
He chuckled. "They're as good as dead. Nobody'll find them out in that great big swamp, Teddi. I sunk Redfeather's airboat to make sure."
Teddi wanted to murder him then and there, but there was a minor problem --- the handcuffs.
Charlie merged into the heavy University Drive traffic.
"So why don't you just kill me and get it over with?"
"Don't be in such a hurry. I've booked you for a front seat at our people's demon ritual tonight," he announced cheerfully. "You, and you alone, will be the only outsider to witness its pageantry --- its grandeur."
"What if I refuse?"
He scowled at her. "You won't have a choice," he said callously. "And, I further arranged for you to have a significant role in the festivities."
Teddi slumped in her seat. Like Charlie's other victims, she was doomed.
Dex guided the airboat around several small islands, but so far they'd failed to locate the right one. Jackson's psychic GPS trail had died out a half hour ago, and he realized that might portend John Redfeather's death.
They were about to call it quits when Dex shut down the noisy engine and pointed to a tree-covered lump in the distance.
"Kinda looks familiar, Jackson," Dex said, pointing. "But I'm not real sure."
"Let's take a look anyway," Jackson said. "My batting average is zero up to this point, and we could certainly use a home run."
Dex fired up the engine again, and they sped the hundred yards to the sandy key. Dex shouted at his companion.
"There's a trapdoor over there under those trees," he exclaimed from his higher vantage point at the stern.
Jackson didn't wait for Dex to beach the craft. He jumped feet first into the water and swam to the small island. He raced to the trapdoor, turned to Dex, and made a slashing motion across his throat. Dex immediately killed the engine.
"Throw me that crowbar you brought along," he shouted.
Dex didn't waste words; he just heaved the heavy tool onto the beach where Jackson quickly retrieved it. By the time Dex had anchored the boat, Jackson peeled back the rusted hinges like soup can lids and threw the broken door aside. It lurched to a halt, hindered by the recently padlocked chain that looped through the steel ring and catch.
Dex joined Jackson at the edge of the black hole. "This is the place! Down there," he gestured, breathing heavily. He was still enervated from yesterday's adventure.
"Jilly! John!" Jackson yelled into the darkness.
No answer.
Jackson lost no time scrambling down the slick ladder. His feet slammed into the flooded tunnel with a splash, and coughing erupted to his right. His flashlight beam revealed John supporting a flaccid Jilly. Both leaned feebly against the side of the tunnel, standing on a thick, elevated root. The deep water merely lapped their ankles.
The trembling professor was unconscious when Jackson scooped her into his arms and scaled the ladder. He left her with Dex and scampered back down for John. The next time he emerged, John was holding onto Jackson's back for dear life.
Dex had already placed Jilly inside the boat and wrapped her with a heavy wool blanket by the time Jackson and John arrived. John gratefully accepted his blanket, and stretched out beside Jilly on the deck. Suddenly, Jilly's eyes flew open and she seized Jackson's hand.
"Demon! Tail. Orange . . . eyes!" she whisper-shouted. "Tonight. Please . . . be . . . very careful. The mosa . . . saur . . . killer . . ." She passed out before she could complete her sentence.
Dex exchanged puzzled glances with Jackson.
"John, what's Jilly talkin' about?" Dex asked his friend.
But John didn't hear him; he had slipped into a dreamless sleep.
Dex hauled in the anchor and steered the airboat back toward Gator Creek. As soon as Dex saw signal strength bars on his cell, he relinquished control of the craft to Jackson so he could call 911. After identifying himself, he demanded that a pair of ambulances and an EMT team be on hand when they arrived at the dock.
Not only were the ambulances and EMT at the dock, but also Sheriff James Stark. The medical staff immediately took charge of the patients.
"What's going on, Dex?" the Broward County sheriff demanded, scrutinizing his older counterpart suspiciously.
"FBI business," Jackson retorted.
"Don't give me that shit, son. I need to know . . . and now!"
"What's the hurry?" Dex asked. "You act like someone just lit your britches on fire!"
"Yeah! Don't you see the fucking smoke, Lowe?" he snapped back. "I know you guys are investigating that mosasaur thing, and I need to know what you dug up."
"Tomorrow," Dex said wearily. "We'll exchange intel then."
"Not tomorrow, goddamm it! I need to know right this very minute!" he shouted angrily.
"What's the hurry?" Jackson asked, as he checked his watch. It was six-thirty. He and Dex were an hour and a half late for their rendezvous. They had to get the hell out of there.
"That damned monster was spotted out in the Gulf an hour ago by an oil rig crew. And, it's headed back here! Back here! Shit, we'll be inundated with those beached alligators again."
Jackson feigned surprise. "No kidding!"
Stark scowled at Jackson. "Do I look like a fucking comedian, Swamp Jack?"
Jackson gritted his teeth. He hated that name. "No, of course not." A clown maybe! "We'll be glad to give you a hand, Sheriff. Just let us see our friends off, and we'll be right back."
James Stark puffed his chest haughtily. "Fine. Fine. Never let it be said that James Stark is not a humanitarian," he crowed. "But hurry up!"
Dex and Jackson drifted between the emergency vehicles and over to Dex's car. While Stark was busily addressing the hastily assembled reporters, Dex inched his car from the gravel parking lot and sped away.
"Teddi's gonna be climbin' the walls wonderin' where the hell we are," Dex said, glad that there was a brief respite from the rain.
"Yeah, but it's odd that she hasn't called either one of our cells to find out about Jilly and John. Maybe her meeting with Charlie went into overtime."
Dex's eyes narrowed. "Nah. She'd check anyway. You know Teddi."
"Now that you mention it, that is out of character. She's usually overly concerned. Maybe she napped and overslept. After all, she's been through a lot lately."
"You mean the coma or last night?" Dex inquired playfully.
He grinned. "A little of both." His cell rang, and he immediately answered it.
Dex mouthed, "Teddi?"
Jackson shook his head. It was his State Department friend. When he hung up, he was as pale as a ghost.
Dex pulled off the street into a grocery parking lot. "What wrong? Is it Teddi?"
He nodded as if in a trance. "Teddi's in deep trouble."
"Why? C'mon, give!" Dex insisted, his face twisted into blazing anger.
"Turns out that Teddi's lunch date this afternoon was with our Voodoo Man," he growled.
"What!" Dex exploded. "You can't mean Charlie Simmons."
"Charlie Swinson is the name," Jackson growled. "His folks were immigrants from Great Britain, indirectly from Brazil." Which explained a lot. Obviously, Charlie had used their fishing friendship to condition Jackson's mind for the psychic block. And that meant that good ole Charlie was a psychic, too. No wonder Jackson hadn't been able to see who was behind the entire grisly affair.
And now Teddi was about to pay for his psychic Achilles' heel.
When Dex and Jackson arrived at the motel, there were no messages from Teddi, and her room was empty. Jackson placed a call to the Fort Lauderdale FBI facilities and was informed that neither Charlie Simmons nor Teddi McCoy had checked into the building that day. Jackson slowly replaced the receiver. Their worst fears were realized.
"Bad news?" Dex asked.
"No news." He quickly repeated his conversation with the FBI office.
"Where in tarnation could they be?"
"I'm not getting any psychic answers now, either. I'm totally blocked."
"Well, I have an idea."
Jackson looked at the sheriff. "You're hot today. Shoot."
"What say we visit the grotto lake a little early."
Jackson's eyes narrowed. "Of course! The ceremony! They'll be there."
Teddi rode across the flooded Sawgrass Expressway to Demon Key in a tourist airboat, Swain's Swamp Explorer. It was crowded with what appeared to be a large group of married couples celebrating their anniversaries, but Teddi figured that they were all to play a part in tonight's temple ceremony. And, she noticed that they were all carrying sidearms. Charlie remained mum the entire trip, no doubt ensuring that he hadn't overlooked anything important for tonight's big show.
Once the boat docked, the group trudged across the flooded key toward the mausoleum. Charlie kept a close eye on her, but that didn't prevent her from imagining escape scenarios. Each presented a similar obstacle --- the damn handcuffs.
When they reached the mausoleum, she and Charlie entered alone and descended the ladder. The others remained outside, sentinels beneath umbrellas. The temple was fully illuminated with a brilliant golden glow; the grotto lake now completely submerged the single dark step.
Teddi stopped halfway to the temple and fought back a paralyzing fear. Squirming naked people were shackled and spread-eagled against the six urns atop the altar, screaming hysterically for their release.
"What are you doing to those poor creatures?" she demanded angrily.
"Bleeding them, Teddi. Call it my personal blood bank." He laughed at his own pun and shoved her forward.
Six powerfully built, hooded men stood stationary on the altar. They wore a simple loincloth, no shoes or shirts, and sported magnificent feathered headdresses. She didn't recognize any of the long feathers.
"Who are those guys?" she asked as they reached the steps leading up to the altar.
"Friends of mine from Brazil. They're well versed in the black arts."
She watched in horror as the men peeled the dead, emaciated victims from the urns' shackles and tossed their limp bodies into the black lake waters. Then they disappeared into an arched opening at the far end of the altar. Teddi didn't remember it being there before. Soon, the hooded men returned, dragging more kicking and screaming sacrifices. Each new victim was thrown against the urn, where they were pressed firmly against the blood-absorbing surface.
"The urns should be overflowing shortly. When that happens, our other guests will be invited down to join us, and the festivities will begin," Charlie explained smugly.
"Why are you doing this?" she questioned him.
"I guess it won't do any harm to explain. I'm not needed yet, anyway," he began. "You see, my mother's maiden name was Swinson. One of the Brazil Swinsons, related to Si Swinson, who originally settled on Demon Key. I'm sure you know the story."
"I do. Go on."
"My uncle's family settled on this godforsaken swamp lump for a reason. During one of his smuggling trips to Florida, he overheard the Indians mention a powerful magic below Demon Key. Really bad magic. My ancestors loved the black arts, so Si bought the place. Sort of. I mean, he killed Edward Loggins and his surviving son and spread the rumor that they had abandoned the place, and then he waited for Florida to put the abandoned property on the auction block. And, the rest is history, except Si's kids reformed, as you might say, and lost interest in the black arts. Instead, they protected this place from me and their other relatives," he sneered. "Well, I showed Bo."
"How?"
"The same way I controlled you. I transferred a spirit into his body."
"So that's why he kidnapped me and was so reckless at the high school. You wanted him dead."
"And you under my control. Before he died, the spirit passed into your body, but not before I had the bastard carry out one final command."
"Passing that weird flute to Jackson."
"Right. Since the case was over and Jackson's contract services were no longer required, I wanted Jackson to return home with the flute."
"So the mosasaur would follow him home to Louisiana. But why?"
"To keep that damn mosasaur away from here --- at least until the ceremony was successfully completed and my destiny fulfilled."
"And what destiny might that be, if you don't mind my asking?" Teddi persisted.
"Why, the most sought-after destiny in the world, my dear. World domination."
"That's not very original, Charlie, or realistic. The world's too big now for that."
"It's too bad you won't be here to see yourself proved wrong, because immediately after the ceremony, you'll be my first sacrifice."
Jackson and Dex scrutinized the sizeable cluster congregated around the Demon Key mausoleum through a pair of powerful binoculars kindly abandoned by Ryan Wilkerson and his hit team in the bayou. From their vantage point beside the pole barn, Jackson remarked that the innocuous-looking group's umbrellas resembled a multi-colored mushroom patch.
"Yeah, they do." Dex paused. "In hindsight, I think Simmons put Wilkerson in charge of this crime scene to make sure that the FBI didn't uncover anything," Dex speculated.
"Wouldn't bet against it," Jackson replied, lowering the binoculars. "Our problem, as I see it, is how to get past that crowd to the grotto."
"Too bad your Blackhawk friend's still not hangin' around."
"Yeah," Jackson muttered thoughtfully. "You know, I bet those people are part of Charlie's show. I say we wait until they're called in before we make our move."
"Makes sense, but we might be cuttin' Teddi's rescue a tad close."
He looked regretfully at Dex. "Under the circumstances, it can't be helped."
Charlie gestured curtly to the six hooded men, and two of them broke ranks without delay and hustled down the steps.
"One more question?" Teddi pleaded.
He scowled at her. "This is getting tiresome, but go ahead."
"Why'd you put me in charge of the investigation down here? Wouldn't it have been easier for you to keep me out of this case?"
"Not really. I wanted Swinson caught, and I had enough confidence in Ryan that he could catch Swinson with a little help from me. But, I wanted to give the investigation the appearance of being completely legitimate. I didn't want Ryan to be the focal point of the search in case someone got suspicious, so I hired Jackson and put you in charge.
"Since Ryan was officially out of your loop, so to speak, he could keep an eye on both you and the key for me. When you were under fire from Swinson, I directed Ryan to help you, Jackson, and Dex, which allayed any of your doubts that he was still working on your side," Charlie explained. "Plus, Ryan made certain that nothing of consequence was discovered by our FBI crime scene team on the key. He even confiscated Swinson's curare-tipped darts from his house on the key before you or Jackson could find them." He repressed a grin. "Of course, your precious Jackson was supposed to find the dead woman sitting on the bomb in the attic, but unfortunately he managed to escape that trap." He paused again, thinking. "Ryan intercepted your lab results from Carl Landers on those dock tissues concerning Carlos Fuentes' death. I couldn't have that 'DNA Unknown' report dropping into your lap. And that, my dear, is pretty much it."
"Was it your brainstorm to have Bo kidnap me and put me in the coma?"
He grinned. "Oh yes, your kidnapping was in my plans from the beginning. The coma was merely a ploy to keep you on ice, so to speak, until I needed you."
"Bastard!"
He turned and addressed the men waiting obediently beside him. "One of you bring my followers down here, and the other prepare this woman for the ceremony. Get her out of my sight!"
Teddi thrashed in the hooded man's grip as he dragged her up the steps toward the hideous demon statue. The handcuffs jingled and chaffed her wrists. A taut knot in the pit of her stomach presaged that she was done for . . . unless Dex and Jackson materialized before she bit the bullet. Or, whatever that lunatic Charlie had in store for her. She fought back tears. After all, she was an FBI agent. A professional.
And a dead woman.
Charlie Swinson-Simmons stroked the shaman ceremonial robe fabric. The bejeweled garb had been passed down from generations of his shaman family, and pride surged through his frame. A host of demons had been brought into this world by the wearer of the robe, and with its intimidating magical powers, his family also controlled much of the Brazilian drug smuggling trade. Any foolish enough to betray his family were horribly dispatched. Freelance smugglers, who refused to recognize his family's reign, were hunted, mutilated, and fed to the jaguars. There was nothing left to bury.
Now he was on the verge of unleashing the ultimate demon. Negalwin. The Conqueror. Unstoppable. Invulnerable. And soon, under Charlie's absolute control.
He draped the magical robe over his shoulders and noted that the blood urns were overflowing onto the altar floor. Excellent! A dozen Brazilian shamans were on hand to assist him in conjuring the substantial evil energy required to transform the Negalwin from its inanimate state to life.
He listened to Teddi's protests in the temple's side room and smiled. What a surprise it would be when she discovered that she was going to participate in the final ceremonial act. In a way, she was the star of the show.
Her sacrifice would immortalize the demon.
Charlie scanned the temple. It had never aged, despite the passing centuries since its construction. No one alive knew what civilization had built it to call forth the Negalwin, but several discovered Mayan and Incan scrolls hinted that the Olmec were responsible. The writings ambiguously suggested that the ceremony had gone horribly wrong, and that the entire Central American Olmec civilization had been destroyed. People. Cities. Historical documents. Only the mysterious Olmec Head relics remained.
Charlie shook his head. Fools! Amateurs playing with powers they couldn't possibly have understood. He alone possessed the knowledge and command of the black arts to prevent another cataclysm of that proportion.
At long last, his moment was near. His hopes and dreams were about to become a reality. He would rule the earth!
His followers' chants began and gradually rose to a strident pitch. Charlie stepped out from the opulent shaman room hidden behind the Negalwin's gargantuan legs onto the altar. The droning clamor swelled. He glanced down the stairs and grinned.
Teddi, adorned in a sheer shimmering gown, was trussed to a thick pole at the bottom of the staircase inches from the lake. All the pieces were now in place.
Dex and Jackson peered out from the tunnel into the grotto and gaped at the fanatical spectacle. Throngs of naked men and women with shaven heads chanted and bowed on either side of the golden stairs, worshipping the grotesque granite sculpture rising menacingly to the grotto's domed ceiling. Six black-hooded men flanked the altar, three on each side. Six robed men stood behind each threesome like evil monks, with their heads bowed and their mouths moving in identical motions.
Dex's lips shrank to a taut line, and he elbowed Jackson. "Look." He gestured toward the bottom step. Teddi was bound hand and foot to a large pole!
Jackson's blood ran cold, and he was about to leap forward when Dex restrained him.
"We've got to save her!" Jackson exclaimed, his childhood anxiety stifling his reason.
"I know, but not by chargin' in there with guns blazin'!" he hissed into Jackson's ear. "And besides, I don't have enough left in the tank for an all-out war."
"Then how?"
"Stealth."
"What?"
"We'll sneak along the bank, blend into the crowd, and make our move."
"I'm not taking off my clothes."
"Thank God!"
Patience was never Jackson's strong suit, but he grudgingly agreed. What other choice did they have? He glanced down at the AK-47 in his hands. If Dex's stealth strategy didn't work, he was all for mowing down the resistance between them and Teddi. He would not allow her to die!
They stayed to the shadows beyond the reach of the temple's glow. The closer they got to the temple, the more Jackson gawked at the ghastly demon statue. He'd practically ignored the figure during their first trip because he'd been too engrossed in locating the catalyst for the temple light. But now that the demon was brightly illuminated, he recognized evil in its lifeless eyes. Felt the evil invade his pores.
It appeared to be a water creature with substantial gills and a spiky, fin-like appendage that jutted from its burly neck and thickened as it traveled down its backbone to a stunted tail twenty feet below. Onyx scales covered the broad, crested head. Its fierce face had two pairs of triangular eyes that Jackson guessed would be orange if the demon was actually alive. A fearsome bottom jaw protruded far beyond the upper, and four thickly curved and keen fangs thrust up and over smaller, spiky teeth inside the top of its cavernous mouth.
Two muscular arms arched from both sides of its armored torso, each with six webbed digits, tipped with lethal bony spikes. The massive body rested on ponderous tyrannosaurus-like legs, and the enormous clawed toes were webbed, too. Jackson hoped to hell that Simmons wasn't planning to bring that thing to life.
Charlie strode majestically onto the altar, and if their circumstances weren't so dire, Jackson would've laughed. What a clown! Did he expect anyone to take him seriously?
The ceremonial setting had all the makings of a bad B movie. Jackson momentarily abandoned his crouch for a better view of the proceedings, but Dex instantly pulled him down. Jackson understood. Stay low. Follow the plan.
They advanced until they reached a rocky outcropping near the chanters. As they watched the ritual, they noticed that the genuflecting multitude never rested.
Dex moved his mouth close to Jackson's ear again. "How can these people keep up that hollerin' and bendin' like that?"
They reversed positions. "Most black arts ceremonies need this kind of emotional dynamism to work. Charlie's using these people to supply the spiritual and physical energy needed to conjure a demon."
"Hogwash! I don't believe in demons. I'm a Christian, for godsake!"
Jackson shrugged.
"I think that the temple has 'em all in its spell like it had me before. If we spend too much time here, we'll fall under its spell, too," Dex warned.
Jackson wasn't in the mood for a debate. "Well, General, what's next?"
"Time to push through these rowdies and free Teddi."
"Then?"
"Then start shootin' and runnin', pardner!"
Dex stood and waded into the crowd. Jackson followed, dodging flying elbows and shoulders and trying to ignore the zealous nude women.
A green mist suddenly appeared along the domed ceiling and gathered into a turbulent cloud. Lightning forked and thunder rumbled, sending chunks of rock splashing into the lake.
Dex and Jackson broke free of the crowd and rested at the periphery of the raucous ceremony. Teddi ignored the crazies and concentrated on loosening her binds, but they held firm. She didn't see her friends leap onto the steps and quickly cover the short distance to the pole. Before they could untie Teddi, a verdant lightning bolt struck the step above them, thrusting them backward into the black water. Their weapons clattered on the glowing stone near Teddi's feet.
Several male chanters waded down the underwater steps and fished out the intruders. Their ears rang from the tremendous nearby explosion, but they didn't need to hear what Simmons was saying. They could guess.
But they were wrong. Instead of Charlie shackling them to the altar urns, he ordered his energetic followers to heave them back into the water. Four stood guard at the water's edge so Jackson and Dex couldn't interrupt the proceedings again.
Jackson's mind whirred, desperately seeking a strategy to overpower Charlie's guards, but he rejected each one. He closed his eyes and funneled his mental powers toward Charlie to initiate a mind meld, but the demon cult leader's powers were superior, and he easily rebuffed Jackson's frenetic attempt.
Dex poked Jackson's shoulder. "Let's move out a little further into the lake. I have a bad feeling about this shindig."
Jackson resisted, not wanting to abandon Teddi, but Dex was right again. Without their guns, overpowering the guards and their reinforcements was impossible. Reluctantly, they stroked away from the temple and helplessly watched the ritual unfold, regretting that there was nothing they could do to save their precious Teddi.
Dex's exhausted muscles lost what little residual tone they'd stored since yesterday's unbelievable bear incident, and he floundered in the salt water. Jackson observed his friend's distress and tilted him onto his back.
"You float, and I'll push," he ordered.
"Let's make for the far side of the stairs," Dex proposed. "The guards aren't watching us anymore."
Jackson checked the posted sentinels. Sure enough, they'd turned their backs to the lake to witness the events unfolding on the altar. He gently guided Dex toward the left side of the stairs, while he maintained vigilance on the evil spectacle.
The sacrificial blood magically seeped through the urns and climbed the demon statue's legs! Verdant lightning rained down upon the figure from the swirling cloud, electrifying each blood-clotted section and casting a green aura over the stone surface. The spirited chants grew more feverish as the blood ascended to the base of the demon's neck.
Jackson and Dex had closed to within ten feet of their objective when another wicked pitchfork struck the rocky edge, splintering the bank into flying shards. Jackson dunked Dex a split-second before the deadly fragments shredded him, but he didn't submerge fast enough to save himself.
A few of the jagged projectiles ricocheted off the back of Jackson's head; dizzying explosions rocked his consciousness! Blood streamed into the water. The cool water prevented him from passing out, but he would've preferred that to the trumpeting pain inside his head.
Dex summoned his remaining strength and pulled his companion up to the surface. Jackson sputtered and coughed out a mouthful of the briny water, and slowly shed his wooziness.
Jackson turned toward the altar. The blood had climbed halfway up the demon's lifeless skull! Suddenly, Jackson intercepted a stray thought from Charlie, and he understood Teddi's role in the ceremony. He cringed. When the demon was summoned from Hell, Teddi would become its first victim! It somehow needed Teddi to survive.
Jackson stiffened. Despite the deafening noise, he detected faint popping sounds. Gunfire! The followers in the back rows jerked and toppled to the grotto floor. The chanting diminished, but there was still enough ceremonial energy to boost the blood the final three feet to the crest of the demon's head.
The demon stepped from its statue confines like a wraith, leaving the stone sarcophagus intact. Simmons spun away from his reanimated creature, plucked a sparkling staff from a table abutting the monstrous webbed feet, and descended the golden steps backward toward Teddi. His eyes never left his demonic creation.
Dex sensed movement below them, and his heart wildly struck his ribs. He envisioned the mosasaur devouring the divers yesterday like so many Raisinettes. Death in the form of an aquatic Grim Reaper rose below them like a runaway freight train!
Dex squeezed his eyes closed and half-expected to see his life flash before his eyes, but the bulb of his mental projector must've been burned out, because all he saw was terrifying blackness. Just him and his premonition of death! Cozy.
He peeked out at Jackson, dispelling the blackness. He, too, heard the rapid report of automatic weapons and momentarily forgot the rising doom beneath him. The incessant bending and chanting abruptly ceased, and the naked chanters closest to the tunnel entrance were now lifeless lumps. The terrified followers on the far side of the steps ran helter-skelter from the intruders, severing the temple's mesmerizing spell.
Dex and Jackson glanced beyond the corpses and watched the sprinting shadows and flashing gun barrels advance on the temple. It appeared that Teddi was saved!
Ragged green lightning bolts struck in front of the rescue party, showering them with blasted bits of rock. The gun flashes ceased, and several shadows tumbled into the lake. The survivors retreated toward the tunnel.
As Dex and Jackson helplessly treaded water and witnessed their rescuers' flight, their earlier elation sank to despair.
Teddi was a goner again.
And they were sharing the lake with a murderous mosasaur!
A malevolent wail shook the grotto to its foundation. Dex and Jackson jerked their heads around toward the altar. The demon's four eyes blazed an enraged hell-fire orange, as it took a single step forward, crushing half of the hooded men and monks. The others ran down the stairs and jumped off the sides into the lake. Simmons chanted frantically, seemingly directing the monster to come toward Teddi and himself. It cast a vicious glance at the retreating intruders near the tunnel entrance, and then riveted its terrible gaze on the diminutive Charlie Swinson-Simmons.
Jackson viewed the scene in disbelief. Would a demon of such immense power take orders from a human like Simmons?
Dex disregarded the rising menace below him, and gaped in horror at the unleashed beast. It was unbelievably strong and savage. If that thing escaped the grotto, it wouldn't be long until the human race would be extinct! Or subservient!
The shrieking followers reached the far side of the lake, and Jackson could now hear Simmons's words. They were entirely unintelligible, but he did catch the gist of Simmons's gestures. With his staff in one hand and both arms outstretched, Simmons implored the demon to approach him. The colossal sea monster scanned the grotto for more enemies, and then stepped forward. The top four golden stairs cracked beneath its tremendous weight, and the demon returned to the altar.
Simmons became more insistent. Louder. Angrier.
Jackson glanced up and noticed that the green cloud was gone; then, he looked over at Teddi. Simmons was preoccupied with the stubborn demon --- that was his cue.
"Can you make it to shore?" Jackson asked Dex.
"Sure, but not much farther than the corpses."
"Good enough. I'm going after Teddi."
Dex grabbed his arm. "Be careful."
"You, too."
Jackson swam toward Teddi with powerful strokes, while Dex dogpaddled to safety. Jackson pulled himself onto the bottom step. The demon moved forward again, succumbing to Simmons's magical powers. There was no time to lose.
Jackson slipped off his soaked shoes and socks and crept up behind Teddi.
The demon glared down at Jackson with its orange triangular eyes, reared its abhorrent head back, and roared. The grotto shook, and more of the ceiling plummeted into the lake. The four webbed hands opened and closed violently, as it descended another step.
Jackson's resolve was shaken, but his nerve was intact. His feelings for Teddi over-rode any notions of retreat.
He slid his serrated Navy knife from his belt sheath and leaped up behind the post. With two quick slices, Teddi's arms and legs were free! He yanked her away from the pole just as Simmons turned.
"Kill!" he screamed in English at the demon. "Negalwin, kill!"
The demon pounded down the short distance to his new master with two long strides. Jackson and Teddi didn't have time to run, and they ducked when two of the demon's hands swiped at them. The bony spikes barely missed, and it stepped closer. Dust from the cracked stairs billowed around them, and coughing, Teddi fell against the short wall. The demon bent, its drool splashing beside them, and raised its massive foot!
Jackson glimpsed the temple-eclipsing shadow rise above them and realized they couldn't move fast enough to escape its smashing plunge. He hugged Teddi close to him. His premonition was coming true --- the demon was about to kill him!
Dex reached the bank and collapsed in a soggy heap. He looked into the dust cloud and saw that the demon was about to crush his friends. He swore. There was nothing he could do to help them.
Suddenly, a gigantic silhouette exploded from the lake and seized the demon's torso between its daunting jaws. The stunned behemoth roared with Hell's fury and thrashed in the female mosasaur's crushing grip. They fell against the temple steps with a resounding thud and mashed the ranting Charlie Simmons.
Dex stood and applauded the mosasaur's timely arrival. The female mosasaur was much larger than the male they'd encountered in the bayou. This one was at least seventy feet long. A killer lizard with an attitude!
The demon flailed and ripped flesh off the female's snout with its four lethal hands. The mosasaur's cries mixed with the demon's horrific wails. Her jaws tightened, perforating the demon's armor. Blood cascaded from the wounds like cataracts.
But the female's wounds increasingly sapped her strength, and her fierce grip grew tenuous. One of her paddles was missing, and her blood seeped onto the temple steps. The demon took advantage of her weakened condition by repeatedly slamming its doubled hands into her skull. She slipped toward the lake, and they tumbled into the water. It drove its spiked fingers into her sides, preparing to drown its enemy. Suddenly, another monstrous figure burst from the surface and grasped the demon's neck and head!
The male mosasaur! It had returned to the grotto in time for the ceremony after all! Jackson mused that paleontologists didn't know everything, after all. The mosasaur covered the distance between the bayou and the grotto at an incredible speed.
Stimulated by her mate's presence, the female ignored her acute wounds and clamped her jaws tighter around her enemy. With two mighty tugs, she and the male ripped the demon in half. Its struggles and unearthly wails ceased abruptly.
Dex exhaled deeply. The demon was a goner! He looked for Simmons, but all he saw was a pulpy red blot near the splintered pole in the settling dust.
Dex stumbled toward his friends, but the grotto walls started spinning around him. The golden temple blurred, and the spent sheriff dropped hard to his knees before toppling onto his side, unconscious.
Teddi welcomed Jackson as he entered the private terminal at the Fort Lauderdale airport. Jackson's sense of style hadn't changed since she'd first met him. He wore his typical white slacks, white linen shirt, and sandals.
He appraised Teddi as she ran to him. Her white shirt, black slacks, hip holster, and black shoes proclaimed FBI business all the way, but she hugged him tightly.
"You're looking, uh . . . official," he offered.
She grinned. "You certainly know how to sweep a girl off her feet, Jackson."
They walked leisurely toward her rented car.
"Sorry. Flattery's not my strong point," he apologized.
Teddi squeezed his arm. "That's an understatement."
They slipped into a waiting black Towncar and cruised toward I-95.
He scanned the luxury car's interior. "You've moved up in the world."
She puffed her chest and laughed. "I'm the new district supervisor."
His brows arched. "Really! Which district?"
"Charlie's. The southeast."
He studied her as she merged into the heavy freeway traffic. "Hmm. My neck of the woods."
"Looks that way . . . unless you move out."
He laughed. "Fat chance."
"That's what I thought."
Jackson turned and faced her. "So what else's new with you?"
"I'm driving in the Florida sunshine for a change. The rain's over for a while."
"That's not what I meant."
She flashed him a teasing glance. "No shit, but I'm not talking till our barbeque at Dex's. That's why we're having a group get-together, remember?"
He grinned slyly. "Just thought I'd give it a shot."
Dex greeted them from the smoking backyard barbeque pit when they rounded the corner of his house. Jackson noted that there were a few more gray flecks in his thinning auburn hair. Jilly was there, too, sporting a brief spandex sports top and slimming shorts. She was definitely not the stereotypical, fossil-hunting college professor. John Redfeather sat on the end of the picnic table tucked in the shade of an ancient banyan tree and spoke earnestly to Jilly.
Teddi waved to Dex. "Look what the cat dragged in," she said, and hugged him.
"I gotta get rid of those cats one of these days," he teased, and firmly shook Jackson's hand like old friends. "The beer's in the cooler. Help yourself."
"Don't mind if I do," Jackson replied. He lifted two dripping beers from the ice chest, twisted off the caps, and handed one to Teddi.
She clinked her glass bottle against his. "Cheers."
"To good times," he countered, and took a long swallow. The company, beer, and sunshine invigorated him.
Jilly and John drifted over, and they exchanged warm greetings.
"What're you grilling, Dex?" Jackson asked.
"Ribs. I can't barbeque anything else. I turn perfectly good hamburgers to cinders and hot dogs into carbon rods. Ribs are my one and only specialty."
"Must be a gene," Jilly added with a grin.
Dex dodged a thick plume of smoke. "A recessive gene. My mom and dad couldn't grill worth a damn."
Everyone laughed, and soon they were seated in the welcome shade feasting on ribs, cole slaw, baked beans, corn on the cob, and a summer pasta salad. Everyone dug in with gusto, and it wasn't till the final square inch of stomach space was filled that anyone uttered anything besides compliments to the chef and cooks.
"My cole slaw is the best the Publix deli can make," Teddi confessed, and the others groaned with laughter.
"I don't know about you all, but my gut's ready to bust," Dex stated, and patted his bloated stomach. "Let's retire to the comfy chairs on the back porch."
There were no arguments. The stuffed group stretched out in the closest available porch chairs.
Teddi was the first to speak. "I'd like to fill you in on what I've been doing with our case the past month and a half."
"Go for it, girl," Jilly said, with a fleeting grin.
"Thanks." Teddi scooted upright. "Before I was promoted to district supervisor, I was ordered to oversee a Charlie Simmons background investigation. Jackson, your buddy Art Holloway helped me out a lot."
Jackson nodded, and she began her narration.
"Art and his Brazilian contacts ran an extensive check and discovered he was in cahoots with two of Brazil's largest drug and animal smugglers. His family has been connected with the same people for over a hundred years. They were black-arts shamen who used their magic to coerce cooperation and pay-offs from the smugglers. The Swinsons were a bad-news lot. When they heard about the ancient demon temple in Florida, they murdered the entire Loggins family and bought Demon Key cheap.
"Bo and his father gradually had a change of heart about conjuring the demon, and that pissed off old Charlie big time. Charlie cleverly arranged Bo's death at the high school, and planned on ruling the world. Well, he did get one wish. I'll bet he and the demon are together in Hell as we speak. Case closed."
"Too bad the bastards had to murder my friend Ike Noonan. He deserved better," Dex lamented.
"Why did Swinson kill him?" Teddi asked.
"Swinson figured ole Ike knew who was behind the kidnappings and might spill the beans to me. I guess Bo couldn't take that chance."
"Did Ike know who was behind the kidnappings?" Jackson asked.
Dex shrugged. "Might have. He didn't say, though."
"Maybe he was protecting you. If he told you, your life might've been in jeopardy," Jackson surmised.
Dex nodded pensively. "Yeah, might be."
John cleared his throat. "On a happier note, I've quit the casino, and I'm traveling with Jilly in September to a North African dig."
The group applauded.
"He's going to be a real asset," Jilly added. "We've practically restored the damaged Seminole cave drawings to their original color."
"What part of the tribe's history did Simmons try to obliterate?" Jackson asked.
"The part showing the grotto demon destroying the Native American villages and devouring the tribes," Jilly explained. "I still don't know its name."
"Negalwin," Jackson told her. "I heard Simmons call it by name."
Jilly leaned over and gave him a hug. "Thank you so much!"
"The mosasaurs got a bum rap for all the bad things happening around here during the rainy seasons, when all along it was the demon," John added. "The mosasaurs were the Indians' saviors, making sure that the demon didn't survive very long."
Jackson pointed at Dex's broken walkway. "You still haven't gotten that fixed?"
"This is South Florida, Jackson. It took me a month just to get someone out here to give me a damn estimate," Dex answered. "The wheels move slowly down here."
The others nodded their agreement.
"While John worked up the nerve to quit the casino, Sheriff Stark placed me in charge of the mosasaur problem," Jilly announced. "By the time I chose my team, the mosasaurs had abandoned the grotto. My divers found an underwater passage leading to the Atlantic. We released dye into it, and it appeared about twenty miles off the coast of Boca Raton."
Jackson lit a Cuban cigar. "Could the divers make it through the passage?"
She crossed her legs and rested her folded hands on her lap. "They couldn't. The currents were too strong, but we sent in a submergible with cameras. The videos showed us spots that would be impassible for the mosasaurs during dry seasons. Which, by the way, is every year except the monsoon-like summer we just experienced."
"Thank God," Jackson said, puffing a series of smoke rings into the still air.
"Hey, Jilly, did you ever find out how the whole danged temple lit up like the Fourth of July when the water hit that black step?" Dex asked.
"I'm afraid not. Some government metallurgists are looking into that right now, but so far all they've told me is that the temple's made of an unknown gold alloy, not solid gold. They think that the saltwater acts like an electrolyte and somehow charges the alloy like a voltaic battery," Jilly responded.
"Interesting," Dex said, tipping his beer bottle to his lips.
"What I'd like to clear up," John began, "is how Sheriff Stark knew to show up in the grotto during the ceremony?"
Dex chuckled. "He saw reports of the alligator population scramblin' for dry land again, and he put two and two together --- which for Stark, is a stretch --- and he figured the mosasaur was headin' back to the grotto. So, he gathered his sharpshooters together and hightailed it out to Demon Key. Of course, he didn't know a thing about the demon." Dex chuckled. "I imagine when that thing came to life, he about shit his britches!"
Everyone roared.
Dex snapped his fingers. "I nearly forgot." He rose, stepped inside, and returned a moment later with a small package wrapped in brown shipping paper. "This arrived for you, Jackson, over at my office."
Jackson took it and perused the label. From Art Holloway in Brazil. "I wonder what he's sending me," he said, clenching his cigar firmly between his teeth.
"Open it," Teddi urged.
Jackson ripped away the paper and lifted the lid of the plain wooden box. Everyone leaned toward Jackson. He removed a wad of shredded paper, and looked wide-eyed at a large, clear gemstone necklace. He pulled it out and studied the stone. A milky mist swirled inside. He found a folded sheet of paper on the bottom of the box and read it. He smiled.
"What's it say?" Teddi demanded.
"It's from Art. He says that this necklace is a gift from Yokie." He quickly described his Brazilian friend. "The stone supposedly turns red in the presence of evil."
"It's a little late for that," John said. "The case is closed, as Teddi said."
"Well, you can never tell about the future," Jackson responded, returning the note and necklace to the box.
"You can," Dex chortled.
Jackson nodded. "Sometimes, but it usually involves someone else."
Dex went outside, fished a beer out of the cooler, and returned to the porch. "Got to have me a little after-dinner drink," he announced, and lifted the bottle to his lips.
"So what do we do about Demon Key?" Dex asked Teddi.
She looked at Jackson. "Somebody's purchased it already."
Dex's mouth flew open. "Who?"
"Me," Jackson replied. "And I plan to triple lock that mausoleum entrance to the grotto."
Dex grinned. "Thank God it was you who bought the place. I was thinkin' about takin' some of my retirement funds and buyin' the key myself. Glad I don't have to."
"Let's just hope that it doesn't rain like this summer for a long time," John said.
"It'll happen, and we'll just hope there aren't any more Swinsons hanging around who want to rule the world," Teddi answered.
Jackson shrugged. "We'll just have to keep an eye on it, won't we, Dex?"
"Yeah, I suppose. It has been a little too quiet around here since you and Teddi left, anyway."
"Good. Well, Dex, I have to check into my motel room. I'll see you tomorrow for fishing, right?"
"You bet. Bright and early."
Jackson said goodbye to the others, and walked Teddi to her car.
"So where does this leave us?" she asked demurely.
"As I told you before, I'm not real good at relationships."
She stopped and gazed up at him. "We can work on that if you really want to."
"How about some fishing some day?"
"I'd need plenty of cold beer."
"I can handle that." She rose on her tiptoes and kissed him.
He held her tightly. "You'll make one helluva fishing buddy."
She smiled. "I know."
A week later, Jackson guided his bow-rider around the bend close to his bayou home and was shocked to see somebody lying naked on his dock. When he got closer, he recognized Teddi sunning on a brightly colored beach towel beside a suitcase and beach bag!
He moored the boat, and Teddi peeked out from beneath her arm.
"Just catching some rays, Jackson," she said with a grin. "You mind?"
He jumped from the boat, pulled her to her feet, and kissed her.
"I didn't think I'd see you for ages," he managed, his eyes roaming her sexy body.
"I had some vacation time coming, and Cole brought me out here. I thought we could work on your relationship problem."
"It seems to have solved itself."
She kissed him again. "Good. Now we can work on your other problem."
He frowned. How did she know about his anxiety attacks?
"I don't . . . don't know what you mean," he stammered.
"Well, don't get bent out of shape. I'm sure they'll leave you alone eventually."
Jackson was totally flustered. "Who's they?"
Teddi pointed at the two mosasaurs surfacing behind him.
"I could really use that cold beer about now," she murmured demurely, and kissed him again.
ALSO BY David Brookover
Mortal Eclipse
FBI Agent Nick Bellamy's world is shattered when the phantom assassin he's been tracking for years brutally murders his wife. Now a broken man driven by vengeance and guilt, Nick is suddenly drawn into an investigation of a ghastly plot to annihilate the human race, initiated from a 1960's top-secret government project, Mortal Eclipse. This project resulted in the accidental release of a monstrous, unearthly killer - his phantom assassin! Nick must reconcile his personal demons as he battles a sinister underworld of otherworldly adversaries, witches, and murderous mutants in order to save mankind. But time is running out . . .
Editorial Reviews for Mortal Eclipse:
"Tensely written, like reading Stephen King or Dean Koontz." - Midwest Book Review (May, 2005)
"Sickly humorous moments keep the novel from becoming melodramatic . . . the conclusion pulls the stray ends of the plot together very convincingly." - Writer's Digest (March, 2005)
Learn more at: http://davidbrookover.net
ALSO BY David Brookover
The Ancient Breed
The end of mankind . . .
FBI Orion Sector agents, Nick Bellamy, Neo Doss, and Crow, realize the dire consequences of failure as they investigate two chilling, international schemes that threaten man's existence. The first entails a bloodcurdling plot to seize control of the world's governments. The second involves the theft of the recently discovered Fountain of Youth that not only unleashes its invincible demon guardian, but also invokes the Curse of the Ancient Breed. Battling the dark forces that threaten mankind leads the Orion Sector agents to a single web of uncharted terror. Nick Bellamy is unaware that only he possesses the unique powers necessary to destroy his four thousand year old enemies and defeat the savage ancient breed. When Nick finally unravels the secret of his extraordinary physical abilities, it leads to a horrifying revelation . . . one that could doom the world - or save it.
Editorial Review for The Ancient Breed:
"FBI agent Nick Bellamy is back in a second novel that picks up just after "Mortal Eclipse". This time Bellamy must tie up the connection between the fountain of youth and a monster that is preying on people in Florida. The story is tense with numerous conflicts that steer the tale along, while the writing is sharper and gives the feel of a Stephen King or Dean Koontz. Both books would make a great movie series." - Midwest Book Review (September, 2005)
Learn more at: http://davidbrookover.net
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