Diver Down (Mercy Watts Mysteries) (39 page)

I grabbed Lucia’s dry suit and pulled her back down. Todd fought hard and dragged us both up a foot. My vision changed. Wavy lines at the edges. I wasn’t breathing. My reg was still flooded. I couldn’t let go. Lucia thrashed and kicked me hard in the gut. What little air I had blew out. The dry suit material slipped in my hands. I couldn’t hold her. I grabbed Todd’s weight belt instead. He was still trying to swim up, so I yanked him down as hard as I could. They both came down and we were head-to-head. My vision was going black. I grabbed his reg, but his teeth were clamped tight. One last chance. I seized his mask, ripping it away from his face and flooding it. Todd jerked back and released Lucia, frantically trying to get his mask back in place.
 

I punched my reg and it cleared explosively. I sucked in a breath and nabbed Lucia’s reg floating in the water beside her head. Her eyes rolled back. I forced it into her mouth and cleared it. The jolt of the clear brought her back. She put both hands over the reg and breathed deeply. Todd came at us. He snagged her hose and yanked it hard. Her head whipped to the right and for a second I thought he had broken her neck, but she kept ahold of her reg. A blade flashed in the water and then her hose was free, spewing bubbles. He cut the hose. I’ve never seen a look of such panic in anyone’s eyes and I’ve been in plenty of ERs and witnessed unbelievable pain. Lucia experienced pure terror in those moments and it would stay with me forever.
 

I yanked her spare reg out of its spot and thrust it into her face. She wouldn’t spit out the other reg. She was beyond her training. The terror had taken over. I tried to pull it out. No. She wouldn’t release it. Todd crashed into the coral ledge. Mauro had him by the BCD and was punching him in the face. I didn’t think you could punch somebody underwater, but you can. Blood exploded from under Todd’s mask. I let go of Lucia and grabbed Mauro’s punching arm. He had so much trust, he actually dragged me forward with his last punch to the side of Todd’s head.
 

I screamed into my reg, “Help!”
 

Mauro let go and turned to Lucia. He grabbed her mask and flooded it. She instantly released the reg and he popped her spare in. I held her shaking body and we turned back to the ledge. Todd was gone in one of five directions. Mauro gave me the ascend signal and I nodded. He went in search of Todd and we went up slowly. I put a little air into my BCD and then into Lucia’s. By the time we got to twenty feet, she’d managed to slow her breathing. We were face-to-face. Her eyes locked with mine. We were both weeping as we floated upward and I had a curious feeling of not really being there. That this all hadn’t happened and when we broke the surface it would all disappear.
 

I looked up to gauge our depth and saw a body hit the water next to the hull of a boat about fifty feet from us. The man swam back up and treaded water. We were still fifteen feet down and I had to watch as a boat sped away from the other two. The man in the water, maybe Alex, swam to another boat and was gone. We broke the surface and I inflated both our BCDs fully and spit out my reg. Lucia didn’t. I hugged her and then began towing her to the closest boat.
 

“Mercy!” yelled an unfamiliar voice.
 

I looked back and saw Lloyd on
La Isla Bonita One
with Spitball. He eased the boat to us and practically dragged Lucia on board by her BCD. I climbed up under my own power, but just barely. My legs went wobbly when my feet touched the deck and I ran into a canopy post.
 

“Grab that girl, Lloyd,” said Spitball. He was sitting on the deck with a bloody towel pressed to his side.
 

“I’m okay.” I lurched over to a bench and collapsed onto it.
 

“The hell you are.”

“You’re the one who was stabbed.” I dropped my tank and unclipped my BCD. “Was that Alex in the water?”
 

“Yeah,” said Lloyd, gently wiggling the reg out of Lucia’s mouth. “He’s on my boat.”
 

“Did Todd throw him off Two?” I asked. “Where did he go? We’ve got to get him.”
 

Lloyd laughed, left Lucia, and turned the boat. “That’s the spirit. I like you.”
 

Lloyd kicked it into high gear and we followed Todd’s wake. From the look of it, he was going back to the resort. Not a great escape plan, but his family was there. We saw the boat when we came around a curve in the island. He was almost to the resort, but he was going too fast.
 

Please let him crash. Come on. No trial. Just a bloody spot on the sand.
 

He cut the engine.
 

Damnit!

But he was too slow after all and the boat went straight at the beach. Sunbathers ran screaming as he hit the sand. The boat stopped just short of the restaurant deck where a family stared with hamburgers halfway to their mouths. Todd tumbled over the side of the boat and ran.
 

Lloyd cut our engine at the right time and we glided in, barely nudging the beach. I staggered to the side and climbed up.
 

“Where the hell are you going?” yelled Spitball.

“After that piece of shit,” I yelled and stood on the side.

“Ah, hell. I seen that look before. Somebody’s going to die.”

“Not me.” I jumped and trudged through the waist-deep water onto the beach. Twenty shocked tourists stared at me. “Where’d he go?” I asked.

They pointed to the alley beside the restaurant and I got a surge of energy. I ran down the alley, cut through the dive shop, and ran toward Todd and Tracy’s room. At some point I became aware of someone huffing and puffing behind me. I looked back and there was Aaron, red-faced but keeping up.
 

Todd and Tracy’s room was open. They were all gone. A man yelled from the end of the path. “They’re driving away!”
 

We ran down to the office, but didn’t see them. There was only a golf cart there. None of the resort vehicles or cabs.
 

“Shit!” I couldn’t believe it. I’d lost them and they had two kids in tow. I’d never live it down. Oh the hell with it. I turned the corner and ran down the lane, trying to catch sight of them, but they must’ve turned a corner. I screamed in frustration.
 

Aaron drove up beside me in the golf cart, holding a frosty drink.
 

“We can’t catch them in that!”
 

He blinked and took a sip.

“Fine!” I got in. “Floor it!” And he did. It was not an impressive amount of speed and I was embarrassed by the whole deal. Aaron drank his drink and we went up the lane.
 

“You know we’re chasing a would-be murderer, right?” I asked. He was so calm, I had my doubts.
 

No answer, just another sip.
 

“Where’d you get that drink?”
 

“Alfie.”
 

“Who’s Alfie?”

“The guy who gave me the drink.”
 

“You are driving me crazy!”
 

Aaron gave me the glass and it wasn’t half bad. Not that it made up for a family four-pack escaping me, but it was some form of comfort.
 

“You know we’re never going to catch them in this stupid thing,” I said. “If you tell Dad or Chuck that I tried to chase down a murderous family in a golf cart, I will never speak to you again.”
 

“There they are,” said Aaron, pointing to the other resort golf cart making a turn onto the main road into the West End. They were trying to escape in a golf cart. They were stupider than me.
 

Yes!

Todd and Tracy looked back and spotted us. I waved and their kids flipped me off. Nice! We followed them through the streets of the West End, past bars and tacky tourist shops. We were about twenty yards apart, but Aaron and I couldn’t get any closer. We passed a couple of tourist cops, standing next to their bicycles.
 

“Stop them!” I yelled.
 

They smiled and waved. Oh my god! What does a girl have to do to get some assistance?
 

Aaron hung a right.

“Where are you going?” I asked.
 

“Shortcut.”
 

“We’ve been on this island for nine days. You don’t know any shortcuts. Turn around. We’re losing them.”
 

Aaron took back his drink and kept driving.
 

“Aaron!”
 

“We’re on an island.”
 

“What?” I asked.

“Where are they gonna go?”
 

Ah crap.

“They could get on a flight,” I said.
 

“No seats available.”
 

“Or better yet a boat. This place is chock full of boats. They could escape to the mainland or Utila.”
 

Aaron slurped up the last of the drink and gave me the empty cup. He took a sharp left and there was no golf cart.
 

“I can’t believe we lost them. On the upside, our so-called partnership is at an end.”
 

“Tommy says we’re partners,” said Aaron.

“Not after this he won’t. You’ve committed the ultimate offense. The criminals got away.”
 

Aaron took another sharp left. “There they are.”
 

The other golf cart was only five yards ahead.

Damnit. I didn’t know whether to be happy or pissed off that he found them.
 

Aaron had it floored, but we couldn’t get any closer.
 

“I can run faster than this,” I said.
 

“Okay.”
 

Ah crap. Now I have to do it.
 

I waited until Todd’s cart hit a hill, then I jumped out and ran to them. I grabbed the back post and swung up beside Tara, who proceeded to smack me.
 

“Stop it, you little hooligan!” I yelled.
 

So, naturally, Tyler started smacking me, too. Those little hands hurt. Dad was right. I should’ve brought my taser. I’d have tased that kid. I’d have tased him good. I climbed onto the back seat, despite the rapid-fire smacking and got in position to leap onto Tracy, who was driving. Then Tara bit my leg and Todd turned in his seat and started whacking me with his wife’s purse. I had brief flashes of tourists watching us go by with open mouths. Not my finest moment.
 

I got my feet under me and lunged at the wheel. Then we both had the wheel and the cart started weaving left and right. A cop car pulled up beside us and blared the siren. Ear-splitting, but I wasn’t letting go.
 

The cop’s window went down and he yelled. “Pull over!”
 

“I’m trying!” I yelled back.
 

The siren blared again.
 

“It’s over, idiots!” I yelled.
 

“It’s not over, slut,” yelled Tracy.
 

“Slut!” I lunged, ramming into Tracy and knocking us both out of the cart and into the cop’s passenger door. He stopped just before we went under the rear tire. We lay there for a second, winded and dazed. A car door slammed and the cop yelled, “Freeze!”
 

I don’t know where he thought we would go. My legs were tangled up in Tracy’s and both our heads were under the car.
 

“Tracy!” yelled Todd.
 

“Do not move, sir,” said the cop.
 

“I have to help my wife. That slut attacked her.”
 

Again with the slut.

The cop yelled for someone to call the police station and the pebbles started biting my side. “Can we get up?”

“Shut up,” said Tracy and she rammed my head into the bottom of the car. I got her in a choke hold and we rolled out from under. The cop was yelling. Todd was yelling. The crowd was laughing. I had her face smushed into the blacktop and a pair of Italian loafers walked up to my face. “This makes it all worth it.”
 

Chuck. Freaking fantastic.

“Quiet,” I said. “I’m subduing a suspect.”
 

“You know you could kill her with that hold.” He squatted next to us, revealing the paisley socks I bought him for Christmas.
 

“I’m okay with that,” I said.
 

Todd begged the cop to shoot me and, frankly, that just made me squeeze tighter. The cop told Chuck to back away, but he flashed his badge while mentioning the Lucia situation. Then he put a handcuff on Tracy. “Let her go, Mercy. She’s turning purple.”
 

I did, but only because my arm hurt. Chuck hoisted Tracy to her feet and put her hands behind her back. She screamed that I was a maniac. Not a bad description given my current state. Chuck gave me a hand up. “You’re a badass. Chasing people down in a golf cart. Tackling them in a bikini.”
 

“I hope you’re duly impressed,” I said.
 

“You might want to fix your top.” He grinned at me. “Not to mention your bottoms.”

That completed my day. A crowd of at least a hundred had formed. Half had cameras and I had a breast hanging out and my string bikini was half unstrung. I fixed myself and glared at him. “You could’ve told me that immediately.”

“And ruin the moment? I don’t think so.” He shoved a protesting Tracy in the cop car and tried to subdue Todd, who at that moment decided to go batshit crazy. He started stripping and yelled, “Don’t touch me! I’ve got AIDS!”
 

“Dude,” said Chuck. “If you don’t put your pants back on, I’m going to touch you with my fist.”
 

“You can’t! I’m leaving! I’m going!” Todd kicked off his pants, much to the astonishment of his kids. Tara and Tyler were still sitting in the back of the golf cart with their mouths in Os. They’d never been so pleasant.
 

Todd made a move to dash by Chuck, who grabbed his bony shoulder and squeezed. Todd went down on his knees, his dingus flopping. There’s a picture I’ll never get out of my head.