Chapter 68
“Shut up, would you? I’m sure he heard you,” Lainie said.
“You got nowhere to go, lady.”
“Neither does he.”
Lainie had braced herself against the galley counter as the boat bounced along.
She couldn’t tell if she heard footsteps or if it was just the water slapping against the side of the boat.
Lainie couldn’t shut him up unless she tasered him again, and she decided instead to take the fight to Vine.
She brought the gun up, expecting him to appear at the top of the stairs. He didn’t. The big guy kept yelling.
A flash caught her eye and she dove to her knees.
Bang, bang, bang—three bullets came from behind and smashed into the counter above her head.
Lainie rolled and turned to return fire, landing on the big guy’s legs. She fired twice and heard a surprised grunt.
The big guy kicked his legs to get her off of him, but she was already moving.
The shots had come from behind, so she bounded up the stairs and swung around, wobbling on the bouncing deck.
In two steps, she saw Vine. He’d lost his balance and slipped through the railing.
He hung on as the boat bounced along. Lurching forward, Lainie shoved the gun into her waistband and grabbed him, pulling with all her might.
There was no way he was going to escape her arrest and then the eventual trial for the murder of Daphne Sparks.
The fear in his eyes gave her no pleasure. When he was on deck, she saw that she’d hit him in the shoulder. He moaned in pain. She dragged him to the top of the stairs, no easy task with the boat bouncing along on the ocean, and then she went below and found a first aid kit.
By the time she returned, Vine had passed out; he’d lost a lot of blood. When she stopped the bleeding, she talked to the big guy. He’d sat up by now, and his face was streaked with sweat, but he couldn’t get free of the knots she’d tied.
“Do you want to tell me how to stop this thing?”
The Coast Guard commander told Ben that they were taking the most common route to Catalina.
“Detective Shea told me that the Havana is not equipped with AIS, an automatic-tracking system, so without an eye in the sky, I’m not optimistic.”
“I hope that I have enough optimism for the both of us. We will find her.”
The commander nodded and went back to his station while Ben stayed at the rail. He searched the sea ahead of them, praying for a sighting. The ocean certainly was a huge place when a person was trying to find a single vessel.
They’d been traveling for about ten minutes when the cutter changed direction. Ben turned and looked back toward the commander, who smiled and gave a thumbs-up. “We’re getting a Mayday from the Havana.”
“What?”
“Your officer. She’s got control of the boat. She read us what the instruments are telling her. We’ll be with them shortly.”
Ben couldn’t say that he was surprised. He fought a smile. “What happened?”
“The Mayday says there’s been a shooting on the Havana, and she didn’t know how to slow things down, but we talked her through it. One injured, one restrained, per her report.”
Who was injured? Ben wanted to ask, but the commander returned to his duties.
After what seemed like forever, but he knew was just a few minutes, Ben saw the yacht. It bobbed on the swells in front of them, and the cutter slowed.
It wasn’t until he saw Lainie waving at them from the deck that he relaxed.