Fool Me Twice (Riley Wolfe 2)

“What? What does that mean?” he said without looking.

“I feel like killing you again,” she said. “Since you know what I mean, why the fuck does it matter what I call the bathroom?” she said.

“It’s hallowed naval tradition,” he told her.

“Well, unless peeing on the deck is also hallowed tradition—is there a restroom downstairs?”

“First door on the right,” he said.

“Door?” she said. “It doesn’t have some sort of arcane name like hatch, or porthole?”

“It’s all right,” he said. “Since I know what you mean.”

Monique flipped him the finger and climbed down the ladder from the cockpit. The door, or whatever it was called, to the downstairs part of the boat, or below, was to the right of the ladder. Monique stepped off the ladder and pulled the latch. Nothing; the door was stuck. She pulled harder. Still nothing.

Monique took a step back and tilted her head up toward the cockpit. “Riley?” she called. “This door is—”

The door leapt open and from inside a figure jumped at her so fast she had time only to register that it had a nightmare mask for a face—and then something moved in a blur and slammed into her head, and—

43

I like to think I am good with boats. I’ve put in my time on everything from canoes to square-rigged sailboats, and a boat like this one didn’t really throw anything at me I couldn’t handle. It was big, and it tended to wallow a little, but it was built for these waters, and that’s what mattered. And under ordinary circumstances, I could have handled it with absolutely no problem.

But if you’ve spent time on any body of water bigger than a duck pond, you know that there’s always a problem. Something that comes at you out of nowhere and knocks you for a loop. When you’re in unknown waters—and a totally unknown ocean—then the WTF factor is multiplied.

On top of that, we were headed right into a squall line. It was dead ahead, no way to avoid it. Or anyway, it would have been a squall line in waters I knew about. I didn’t have a clue what kind of storm might blow up here, but I didn’t think it would be gentle spring rain. I had thousands of miles of open ocean on all sides, and that makes the wind stronger, the waves bigger, and the uh-ohs a whole lot scarier. And I could already feel the wind picking up and the rollers getting higher.

So I was staying totally busy doing nothing more than keeping us on course without hitting a wave wrong and taking on water. It took concentration, and that was harder than it should have been right now. I mean, I was just a few hours past getting the crap kicked out of me. My head was still throbbing, and every now and then things would swim out of focus and get far away for a few seconds.

So I admit that I wasn’t paying as much attention to Monique as I should have. I heard her shout something, but I figured it had to be “Where’s the toilet paper?” or “How do I flush?” Something like that. Maybe I should have listened. But what the hell, if she couldn’t find the bathroom and pee by herself, she needed more help than I could give her. And she must have found everything okay, because I heard her coming back up the ladder again pretty soon.

Maybe too soon . . . ?

Like I said, my brain was still not all the way back online. It was moving a little slow. Too slow to figure out that, yeah, Monique was back again too soon, so that must mean—

I half turned away from the wheel, but way too late. She was on me before I could even blink.

I caught a half glimpse of the melted face, and below that a blood-soaked shirt that made her seem even scarier. She smashed into me, jamming me back against the wheel. And then she had her knife at my throat, bending me backward. I could feel the edge of her blade against my throat and the small tickle of blood running down my neck, and I waited for the savage slash that would open my artery and bleed me out.

It didn’t come.

Instead, Bernadette held the knife edge tight against my throat for several long seconds. Then she hissed and leaned her face closer to mine. “J’ai besoin de toi vivant, petit prince,” she whispered. “Pour l’instant . . .”

It was wonderful to hear that she needed me alive, even if only for now. But I had a pretty good hunch it wouldn’t last too long. As soon as I did whatever she needed me for, it would be lights-out for Riley.

And Monique! Was she still in the head? Bernadette probably wouldn’t “need” her. Would she come back up and—or had Bernadette already—

I didn’t get more than a few seconds to wonder before Bernadette was chaining me to the wheel—the same chain Étienne had used on me my first trip to Île des Choux. I could still spin the wheel, awkwardly, but I wasn’t going anywhere.

Bernadette thought so, too. She stepped back away from me, gave me the once-over, and put the knife away. She leaned for a moment against the bulkhead, and I got my first good look at her. She was a mess. Even through the savage scarring of her face, I could see the exhaustion lines, around her eyes and on the unscarred part of her forehead. She looked like she needed a couple of days of sleep. But I had seen her get shot. She should have been dead. And she had definitely lost a lot of blood. That makes anybody weak, dizzy, sleepy.

But Bernadette was on her feet, and she was still fast and strong enough to handle me with no problem. How was that possible? I had seen the shot hit her, spin her around, and drop her.

I took a couple o

f quick looks, and when I added them up I could see why. I thought the shot had taken her in the shoulder, but Bernadette had been moving when it hit. She’d torn the sleeve away on that side, and I could see where the bullet had clipped her on the outside of the shoulder instead. Hard enough to knock her over and soak through the shirt. Unfortunately, not hard enough to finish her off.

Bernadette straightened up and took a Glock from her waistband, probably taken from Benny, judging by the dried blood on it. She gestured at me with the pistol. “Où est la radio?” she said.