“That’ll all take time, Michelle.”
“Which we have none of, so just do it!”
“It’s a big lake. Over five hundred miles of shoreline. Lots of places to hide.”
“Thanks for the pep talk. Just get your ass here.”
She clicked off, jumped out of her truck, ran around behind the house and raced at the top of her speed down to the dock along the lighted path. She kept listening on her phone for helpful sounds, but all she could hear was a roar. If they were in the boat, the engines would drown everything else out.
She reached the dock, hit a switch, and the entire area blazed with light. At that instant an enormous streak of horizontal lightning shot across the sky followed by a snap of thunder so loud she put her hands to her ears.
Her gaze immediately caught the empty slip. “Shit, he’s in the FasTech.”
She got back on the phone. “Todd, he’s in a Formula FasTech. A thirty-five-footer, white with a red—”
“I know that make of boat. You got any idea of the engines that thing’s got?”
“Yeah, twin Mercs, five hundred horses each with kick-ass Bravo screws. If you’re not here in three minutes, I leave without you.” She clicked off.
“Okay, what do we got?” she asked herself as she ran from slip to slip. Sea-Doos were nimble and fast but they had no running lights, and she couldn’t exactly see big Todd being able to either hang on to her while she drove or else maneuver one by himself. Plus, after the lopsided road duel with Roger Canney, if it came down to a battle of the boats, she wanted a little more beef on her side.
She stopped at the big Sea Ray performance cruiser berthed in one slip. It clearly couldn’t match the FasTech in speed, but it was a big boat with big engines—that’s all she needed. She shot the lock off the storage shed, went in, found the keys for the Sea Ray and the remote for the lift the Sea Ray was on and got the boat ready.
Todd Williams came flying up in the golf cart minutes later. He grabbed a life jacket and climbed on board.
“I got hold of everybody. The Game folks are putting their boat in at Haley Point Bridge, that’s fifteen miles upriver. Both the FBI and the state police are sending choppers and snipers just as fast as they can. I got roadblocks setting up at all lake access roads.”
“Good. Now take this and listen carefully. Sean may give us some clues as to where they are.” Williams took the phone and held it to his ear.
Michelle hit reverse throttle, and they sped backward out of the slip so fast Williams fell against the gunwale and almost pitched over the side.
Righting himself, he said, “Shit, Michelle, do you know how to drive this thing? It’s not a damn rowboat.”
“I’m a fast learner. Sylvia’s house—tell me approximately how far it is from here and the compass heading.”
Todd gave her his best estimate, and she swiftly calculated time, distance and route. Actually, while at the Secret Service she’d become quite an accomplished sailor, piloting everything from cigarette boats while guarding former presidents with a love for bone-jarring speed on the water to docile paddleboats with said former presidents’ grandchildren as her very precious passengers.
“Okay, hold on.”
She pointed the bow out to the open channel and slammed the throttle all the way forward. The big Sea Ray groaned a bit at first, like it was waking up. But then its props cut hard into the water, spitting it in all directions. Its bow rose up in the air like a cagey bronco ready to relieve its rider of his perch, and the boat took an enormous leap forward. They were fully on plane within seconds, and the boat blasted right through forty knots as Michelle headed directly into the jaws of the approaching storm on a twenty-thousand-acre lake without having any idea where she was supposed to be going.
CHAPTER
96
“COME ON, WHERE ARE
you taking us, Eddie?” King called out over the sounds of the twin Mercs mixed with the thunderstorm.
He was bound hand and foot with fishing line and was lying on his side on the deck next to the captain’s chair. Sylvia sat in the stern seat, similarly bound, as Eddie drove standing up, the wind whipping his thick hair around.
“What do you care? It’s not like there’s a return ticket from this trip.”
“So why kill us? You filled out your scorecard. You got everybody you were after.”
“Not everybody, old buddy. By the way, I won the bet.”
“What bet?”