8
A razor-sharp branch had torn Dan’s shirt open, Alan’s knees were acting up, and Lenny wheezed like Darth Vader training for a 5K, but an hour later they made it through the woods north of Building C alive. They used the flashlights on their phones to illuminate the way—Dan had to give Lenny a tutorial on where to find his—but they hardly helped. The woods were a nearly impenetrable maze of trees. And not just normal trees. These were trees , hulking sons of bitches standing shoulder to shoulder like riot police, smacking their limbs against their trunks. The thought of returning the same way made Dan weary.
But thanks to Lenny’s sense of direction, they’d made it. They scampered across the desolate airstrip and against the tin siding on the first of three hangars. The plane-sized door was shut tight, and the human-sized door was locked. After taking one final look around, Alan shattered the glass above the door handle, reached through the blinds, and they were in.
God, he was impressive.
The hangar, however, was not. It was cavernous, save for a stack of empty cardboard boxes against the back wall and the skeletal frames of several ATVs from the late seventies or eighties. It smelt of stale air and mildew. Lenny sifted through the boxes, looking for any paperwork he could get his hands on, and Alan inspected the four-wheelers. Dan tapped his foot and watched the door, positive David’s comrades would rain down on them any second.
“Eighty-three Suzuki QuadRunner,” Alan said, and Dan said that’s what he thought too, but really he had no idea. Alan flicked a wheel. “One of the original four-wheel, all-terrain vehicles. There’s a shop back home that restores them. These have been here a while.”
“Nothing,” Lenny said, flinging a final box. “Not a thing here. Bunch of fuckin’ cardboard. Why they need three hangars on an island this size?”
Alan abandoned the Suzuki whatever. “Well, we can’t ride these home. Keep moving.”
“Maybe we split up,” Lenny said. “More quick that way.”
“Ever seen any movie ever?” Dan asked. “Let’s stick together. I can hide behind you when the shooting starts.”
The second hangar wasn’t exactly a treasure trove either, just some old tools in a side office. Dan and Alan were disappointed, but Lenny took a particular interest. “These are farming tools,” he said, confused.
Alan picked caked dirt from a spading fork. “So what?”
“Someone made ’em,” Lenny said.
“Someone makes everything,” Dan said.
“Nah, like, someone made these. Like hand-made ’em. Weird.”
Handmade or not, they were little help. The party moved on.
The final hangar was unlocked. That was the first surprise. The second?
There was a plane in it.
Alan whooped and hollered, and Lenny shook Dan so hard he thought his head might pop off. They circled the plane like banshees, running their hands along the doors, the wings, the propeller, Dan keeping at least one finger on it at all times so it wouldn’t vanish. It was a small plane with a cool red stripe up the side.
“Single engine,” Alan said, scoffing. It was the first time Dan had seen him lose his cool. “I can fly this in my sleep. And it seats—yeah. It seats six. It’s perfect.”
Dan stood on his toes and peered inside a window. Six would be snug, yeah, they weren’t talking ample legroom here, but it would work. He could get Mara home.
The plane was in rough shape—Alan said he wasn’t sure when it’d last seen the sky. He placed David’s pistol on a tool bench and went inside to poke and prod and do whatever it is men do when they know what they’re doing.
Dan couldn’t believe it. A plane . A fucking plane!
“Will she fly?” Lenny asked, kicking the deflated landing gear.
Alan’s head popped out from one of the windows. “She’s a project.” He scanned along the wing, clicked his tongue. “I’m pretty sure she’s a Piper Cherokee. Pretty sure.”
“Could she get us to Nassau?” Dan asked.
Alan laughed. “Nassau? This thing could get us to the mainland. The tip of Florida, at least, any farther might be stretching it. Once we land, we can get up to Miami and, assuming the whole country hasn’t gone to shit, find a way home.”
Any more good news and Dan would take flight himself. “How long?”
Alan’s head reemerged. “What’s that?”
“How long till you can get her running?”
“It depends. A week, tops.” Alan looked out into the hangar. Lenny was poking around, singing to himself. “I bet a lot of what I need is here.”
The hangar was packed with rows of crates and toolboxes and workbenches and other machinery. Dan could hardly take it all in next to the headliner, the plane, their carriage off this godforsaken island.
A week. That’s a long time, but it could work. Lay low for just a week under Princess Lilyanna’s rule. Then Mara could see her mom, Dan could see his family, Alan and Charles could see their boys, and Lenny could see—well, Lenny could see Springsteen at the Garden again. After that? Who knows? Freeze to death, probably. But at least Dan will have done this. Before the end, he’ll have done something .
He navigated the aisles of hangar junk to join Lenny in the back office, leaving Alan to ogle plane guts. Lenny was bent over a folding desk, his phone light scouring unrolled paperwork.
“Get a look at this, kid. All the island’s tunnels, laid out right here. We’re in the money, baby.” Lenny slapped the maps with the back of his hand. “Laundry, food service, storage area, pool pumps, armory, you name it, bro. All right here. Matter o’ fact—”
Armory? “Sorry. Did you say armory?”
Lenny glanced up. “Yeah, well. Armory might be a strong word, that’s what’s written here. Guard barracks, ya know. Where they sleep. That’s underground too.”
“Why does a resort need an armory?”
“This Sheridan guy, he’s like, uh—he’s like—”
“A cokehead.”
“Well, yeah.” Lenny scratched his temple. “But no, see, he’s a—prepper! Guy’s a prepper. Someone told me ’bout it at the pool. But he’s a gun nut too, ya know, he likes guns. And he’s got all of Mommy’s money, so he bought an island, built a playground for himself, and hired these goons to be his friends. And now they’re working for Lilyanna. Heh.”
Dan sighed. Of all the islands in the world to be stranded on after the sun explodes, he and Mara chose the one with assault weapons. He glanced at the files over Lenny’s shoulder.
“What’re you gonna do with these?”
“Get our food back.”
“Get the food back? Lenny, we just found a way out of here. Mounting an underground invasion of Building A isn’t exactly laying low.”
Lenny folded the diagrams and stuffed them in the lower pocket of his cargo shorts. “I don’t care if we got a ferry outta here this second,” he said. “You don’t ever let someone take something of yours that don’t belong to ’em. Nevah. Those pricks up in Building A been stealing from people all their lives. Not my dinner. No way.”
Dan sensed he would need Alan’s help to convince Lenny, so for now he changed the subject. “You said you were a land surveyor in the eighties. You retired?”
“Me and the missus own a deli in Jersey City.” Of course they did. “Fava Deli, corner of Second and Brunswick. Best pepperoni bread in the city. Opened her ten years ago.”
“Ten years, huh? Late career change.”
“Never too late to follow a dream, kid. Nevah.” He kicked a bolt on the ground. “Got my nephew running the shop up there while we’re out. First time we ever left him in charge, ya believe it? Knowing him, he’s letting the neighborhood eat for free, with everything going on with the sky and all that. Real softie, my nephew. Liberal, you know, these kids. Heart gets him in trouble.” There was a streak of pride across his face. “Anyway, so yeah, gotta get back to the deli.”
Dan almost leapt into Lenny’s arms as a furious clack, clack, clack roared from inside the hangar. His first thought was Alan had somehow already got the plane started, but he and Lenny shot from the office to find the whole place doused in blinding light.
Headlights. Security Jeep. Shit . They’d opened the bay door. Dan’s fight-or-flight response immediately kicked in and ordered the regular—flight. As the driver clicked on the low beam, Dan shoved Lenny behind a steel toolbox. The way Lenny folded to the floor made Dan uncomfortable. Men in their sixties aren’t meant to fold, especially not ones shaped like Lenny. Dan’s quivering fingers switched off his phone light and Lenny struggled to do the same but couldn’t remember how. He settled for stuffing the entire thing under his Affliction shirt.
The Jeep’s engine cut off, and multiple doors slammed. Dan inched sideways to find a narrow unobstructed view of the front of the plane, near the propeller. His heart pummeled against the floor. The first thing he saw was sensible pair of pink flats. He scanned up. Toned calves. Pink swimsuit cover-up.
Lilyanna Collins.
She wasn’t alone. Looked like two or three guards. And—
“So this is it,” Brody Sheridan said. He placed his hand on the propeller, sniffed. “Like I told you, it doesn’t work, like, at all. Dr. Shae said it’s been here since the seventies or something. Shit’s busted.” He rubbed the back of his neck. Twenty-four hours with Lilyanna had curved Brody’s spine, turned him into a walking question mark.
Lilyanna circled the plane, her hands on her hips, out of Dan’s sight and then back again. Dan tried not to breathe, prayed that Alan remained perfectly still.
“‘Shit’s busted,’” Lilyanna repeated, her Dolly Parton drawl ricocheting off the corrugated ceiling. “That your opinion, Mr. Sheridan, or the opinion of someone who knows their way around a plane?”
Brody gulped. “Dr. Shae said so too, and he’s a supersmart dude. Like, crazy smart. I know he’s a space scientist or whatever, but he actually knows about a lot of other things.”
Lilyanna laughed, but it wasn’t a real laugh, no way, and she placed a condescending hand on Brody’s shoulder. “Don’t exactly sound conclusive, though, does it? We got any engineers in Building A?”
“I dunno.”
“My Lord,” she said. “She’s a pretty little thing, though, ain’t she? Bit of paint…” She got on her tippy-toes and looked in a window. Dan winced. “Some seat covers… I’d fly around in this thing. Not to Coachella or anything, but around.” She clapped her hands together and squealed. “Would you just look at this! This is God, Mr. Sheridan,. This is God saying, Here you go, Lilyanna. I know it’s not exactly what you wanted, but when is it ever?” She booped Brody’s nose. “God’s always writing our stories, but He lets us choose the endings.”
She tapped her foot, said, “Hmm.”
“I need to find me someone who knows planes. This is it. This is my way back to my babies in Nashville.”
She would live in fucking Nashville.
“You can’t wait for the other planes to come get us?”
Lilyanna stared at Brody, blinked. “Mr. Sheridan. Now, you really think those planes are coming? Sun’s exploded, whole world’s gone dark, chaos everywhere. You think they’re worried about a little ol’ island in the Bahamas? Oh, honey. Honey .”
Brody studied the floor. “But everyone can’t fit on this plane.”
“Aw, listen to you! I love your heart.”
Suddenly, a muffled voice sprung forth from Dan’s shorts, sending Dan and Lenny into a flailing panic. Dan swiped David’s radio from his pocket. He hadn’t switched it off. Shit! Before Dan could figure out how to silence it, the voice continued. “David. Where you at, dude? They want us to check out the docks. Something—”
Dan turned the knob on top and the voice cut out. He pushed Lenny away, thinking maybe there was time for him to hide so only Dan got caught, but the big man wouldn’t budge. Lenny’s phone fell from under his shirt and clattered against the epoxy floor. Lenny scooped it up, and his fingers bounced against the screen as he tried in vain to turn his flashlight off, but all he managed to do was start his music app, so now a song was blaring from the phone’s speakers, and to Dan’s absolute shock, it was Barry Manilow.
They were caught. Again. The worst covert operation in the history of covert operations.
Dan assumed the position, stood with hands above his head, guns pointed at him again, and Lenny used Dan’s waist to hoist himself up, almost yanking down his shorts in the process. Lenny could hardly get his hands above his head, but he did his best.
Dan recognized one of the guards. It was the one who shot Julio, the only one with a rifle. He had a block head, a buzz cut, and he was the size of a shipping container. Dan got a good look at his eyes. Like the sky, there was no light in there.
“Hey, y’all,” Lilyanna said, stepping through her men like they were background dancers. “It’s the boy with the megaphone from earlier! I recognize the big guy too.”
At least that’s what Dan thought she said—“Copacabana” was still pulsating from Lenny’s phone. Lilyanna snatched it and silenced Barry with a dainty swipe. “I wonder what these boys are doing all the way out here after curfew.”
“Fuck you and your curfew,” Lenny said, and Dan grimaced because that’s a tough place to start a negotiation for your life.
Lilyanna feigned offense. “My, my. Is that any way to address a lady?”
Dan knew he’d better start talking, because the big guard’s trigger finger definitely twitched when Lenny did. “Hey, he doesn’t mean it. He—”
“Yeah, I do. Ya fuckin’ c—”
“No, he doesn’t. ” Dan elbowed him. “Listen. Can we just—can we lower the guns for a second? My name’s Dan Foster. This is Lenny. We’re only out here because—”
“What’s this?” Lilyanna bent slowly at the waist and retrieved David’s radio. She waved it in Dan’s face and said, “Tsk, tsk, tsk. Y’all hurt one of my boys? Lord, tell me you didn’t hurt one of my boys.”
Lenny pointed to the man with the rifle. “This motherfucker shot a pool boy.”
Dan’s chin flattened into his chest. When they did his autopsy, under cause of death it would say, JERSEY CITY DELI OWNER W/ VERY BIG MOUTH.
Lilyanna paused. “What happened to that boy has been weighing heavily on me all day, sir. He shouldn’t have rushed us, he really shouldn’t’ve, but I take no pleasure in what happened. Pains me to think he might still be alive if he’d worked with us. Just pains me.”
Okay, the hypocrisy was becoming too much even for Dan and even at gunpoint. Lilyanna closed her eyes in silent prayer, but Dan interrupted.
“You say that, Lilyanna, but tonight you ordered your guards to shoot on sight.”
Lilyanna cocked an eyebrow before her lids opened. “I did no such thing.” She turned to the guard with the rifle. “What’s he talking about, Rico?”
Rico—God, what a perfect name for this guy, Rico —thought over his answer a minute. He eventually lowered the rifle, and the other guards lowered their guns too. “You told us to keep them in line.”
Lilyanna gasped and said, “Oh, hun, no ! Not like that.” She shook her head, pitying him like a puppy in a window. “We just started working together, so we’re still learning each other’s styles. But we barely squeaked past what happened to that waiter. What’s that they say, y’all? Speak softly and carry a big stick?” She winked at Dan, but all he saw was Julio under that beach towel, and he seethed. Lilyanna sagged against a toolbox and equipped one of her more empathetic tones. “Y’all think I’m being too tough? That it?”
“You stole our food,” Lenny said. “Killed the power. You got the medical supplies, the linens, the—”
“You know, y’all, through BeachBod by Lilyanna, I have speaking engagements all over the world. And afterward, these ladies, these mompreneurs who want to escape those nine-to-fives, they always ask me how I did it. How I became who I am today. You know what I tell ’em?”
“Botox,” Dan said, having fully accepted his fate.
Lilyanna pinched his cheek. “Bless your heart. No. I tell ’em to remember the three D s! Decision, determination, and, most important, discipline.”
Oh, no. A business lecture from Lilyanna Collins. Rico could just get it over with.
Dan tried to catch Brody’s eye, tried to appeal to the kid’s humanity, something, but Brody was intentionally avoiding him. He rubbed his arm and looked at the ceiling.
“Now, how’s that apply here?” she asked, pacing. “I made the decision to keep as many people safe on this island as I could. I have the determination to see that decision through. But without the big D , discipline , it wouldn’t be possible! And discipline means doing things you should do, even when you don’t feel like doing ’em.”
“Like killing people,” Dan said.
“Like keeping this island safe, ” she corrected. “And keeping everyone fed. And warm. You boys put that at risk, running around after curfew, hurtin’ my guards, disturbing the peace. Don’t you think I’d rather be up in my room right now, drinking champagne and getting my nails done? I saw a need and I acted. In the interest of everyone. Y’all’re just acting for yourselves.”
“Cut the act, lady,” Lenny said. “We heard you. You’re here for the same reason we are.”
“Forgive them, Father, they know not what they do. I believe in second chances, really, I do.” She giggled and threw her hands in the air. “But y’all got me in a tough spot!”
“Ma’am,” Rico said, stepping forward. “People don’t have to know. I could just, you know, do it quiet.” He raised his rifle, and Dan felt two things at the same time: the cold steel of the barrel against his ear and the knocking of his knees. He was positive this guy would do it. “We could get their wives too, so there’s no one to miss ’em. It’d be easy. We could—”
Dan’s brain hemorrhaged at the thought of this man anywhere near Mara. His fight-or-flight was back, but something was different this time. He wasn’t flying. He felt his body subtly shift toward Rico, felt the hairs on his neck stand at attention, the creases in his knuckles tighten. Rico only needed to move his finger a quarter of an inch to blow Dan away, to seal his fate as a nobody, but there was a reason Rachel Platten’s Billboard Hot 100 hit wasn’t called “Flight Song,” it was called “Fight Song,” and Dan was getting Mara on that plane even if he died trying.
The door on the plane squeaked open, momentarily distracting Rico. Dan leapt atop his back, swinging wildly at his face, pulling at his ears, poking his eyes. He had no chance, Rico was built like a Thwomp from Super Mario World, but Dan wouldn’t let him get to Mara. While Lilyanna screamed, Rico effortlessly swung Dan over his shoulder and cratered him into the hangar floor. Dan couldn’t breathe, but he could still move, so he just kept kicking, kicking, kicking, waiting for the sound of the rifle.
But what he heard next wasn’t a gun—it was a familiar voice crying out.
“Stop! Stop! Get off him. I can fix it! Hey! Stop. I can fix the plane.”