Swamp Monster Massacre (2 page)

He turned to see what had caused the boat to dip and barely had time to register the running man’s frantic face before a fist that was the size of a Thanksgiving turkey and solid as an anchor smashed into his throat.
 

Rooster couldn’t believe it. A getaway boat, already primed and ready to fly! He felt bad about throat-punching the pilot, but he didn’t have time to argue his case with the man.
 

The guy slumped to the floor of the airboat, and Rooster jumped into the elevated seat and started to pull away. The couple at the front were on their feet and about to make a break for it when he shouted above the din of the fan, “Get back in the boat or you’re gonna get killed! Now!”
 

They looked back at him with pure terror in their eyes. Their attention was then drawn to the Cubans tearing down the dock with guns blazing. He saw bits of the dock explode as bullets buried themselves in an ever closer path of destruction. The couple dropped as low as they could on the boat, and Rooster turned the rudder left and away from the dock and Cheech’s minions.
 

Damn, this boat is big and old
. Half of it looked homemade. This was not going to be easy.
 

Everyone on the boat slid to their right, then backward as Rooster hit it as hard as he could to put some distance between himself and those damn guns. He instinctively ducked when a bullet pinged off the top part of the fan cage.
 

For just a moment, he considered dipping into the big duffel, grabbing a pistol and turning back so he could give them a taste of their own medicine. But when he bent down to loop his finger through the straps, he lost control of the airboat.
 

Chapter Three

Rooster cried out, “Godammit!”
 

The duffel rolled out of his grasp as the airboat went into a sideways skid, kicking up a sharp spray of water that doused everyone on board. He’d accidentally lost control of the rudder, and now they were facing the Cubans on the end of the dock.
 

He could see their peroxide smiles as they raised their guns and took aim.
 

This was just the kind of shit they talked about in those anger management classes! He’d let his temper and need to exact payback get the best of him again, and this time he’d delivered his head on a silver platter.
 

Their guns roared to life, and Rooster felt the air around him ripple with screaming slugs. Because of the noise of the fan, he could feel rather than hear them plug different parts of the boat. The woman in front jumped up from her prone position like a rabbit caught in a snare. Her husband pulled her back down and closer to him.
 

Shit! Rooster fought for control of the rudder stick, angling the airboat back out to the waterway and his escape. He stepped on the accelerator, and the fan kicked into high gear.
 

Come on, come on, come on!
Rooster willed the damn boat to move faster. Growing up in southern Florida, he’d had plenty of experience operating airboats, but never one this size. It was moving at a turtle’s pace, and the rudder stick was fighting him hard.
 

Using both hands to get the rudder under control and locking his knee so the accelerator was pinned to the floor, Rooster finally got the airboat to straighten and haul ass. It planed over the water and smoothed out nice and proper.
 

An old-timer in a canoe paddled like a demon to get out of his way, but not fast enough. The airboat clipped the stern with a sharp thud and the canoe spun in a tight half circle, then flipped on its side, pitching the old man, probably out for a day of fishing, into the water. Rooster turned around just in time to see the edge of the canoe clobber the back of the man’s neck.
 

For the second time, Rooster shouted, “Godammit!”

As much as he wanted to turn the airboat around and see if the guy was all right, the thought of giving up even one inch of space between him and the Cubans overrode any sympathy he had. No sense getting everyone killed just to see if some old guy had more fishing days ahead of him. It seemed like a good and proper justification.
 

The wind felt like a gift from God against his damp clothes. He guided the airboat past other, smaller boats, creating a wake that was sure to capsize a fair share. No longer a floating target, he took a good, long breath, his first since coming to on Cheech’s couch.
 

Safety was false and fleeting. He may have avoided Cheech’s gun-toting goons, but when word got back to Cortez, he was a dead man. They had gotten a good look at his mug, and there weren’t many folks who matched his description. Cortez would know it was him that killed his good-for-nothing son.
 

He needed time to think, and someplace where he could do it without ending up with a Colombian necktie. He liked his tongue in his mouth, not dangling out of his severed throat.
 

Pushing the airboat as fast as it would go, he passed the marker for the Big Cypress State Preserve. The waterways would get tricky from here on in. It would be narrow riding past tiny islands of gumbo-limbo trees and sweet bay. If he didn’t slow down, he’d for sure lose the control he’d fought so hard to gain.
 

Pulling his head out of his own troubled thoughts, he became aware that he still had a bunch of people in his getaway boat. Sensing that the initial danger was over, they had crawled up from the floor and retaken their seats, and now all eyes were on him.
 

He knew that look. They were waiting for him to make his move, take them out because they could identify him.
 

Good. That was just the kind of fear he needed. Holding steady on the rudder stick, he successfully yanked the gun duffel onto his lap and dragged the zipper partway open. He casually took one of the guns out, an antique, western draw pistol, and placed it on his lap for all of them to see. It had a mahogany handle and gold engraving along its silver frame and barrel. The damn thing was sweet as hell, and just as deadly. That should keep them in line for a spell.
 

Chapter Four

The airboat sailed along the water in bumps and rolls. Over the past two hours, everything had been a complete blur as they headed deeper into the Everglades. A couple of times, Jack Campos thought for sure they were going to tip over as the maniac who had commandeered their tour skated through the narrow waterways. Jack even had to grab hold of one of the young Italian guys, lest he catapult over the side. The kid shot him an angry look, but it was nothing compared to the mug on the angry goliath in the pilot’s chair.
 

All Jack had wanted to do was slip out of the market research conference for a couple of hours and see the Everglades, maybe spot an alligator or two, and be back in time for the lunch break in the hotel’s large banquet room. Conferences may be dull, but they weren’t deadly.
 

Jack silently cursed himself and prayed that he would make it out alive.
 

In the front of the boat, John Almeida kept his wife, Carol, close to his chest with one arm, while using the other to clutch the bar between their seats so he could brace them against the sudden movements of the airboat. Carol wept, but not out of fear. One of the bullets had pierced the metal hull of the boat and torn a crimson gully through her upper arm.
 

It could have been worse, much worse, but the flesh wound went deep and must have burned like hell.
 

They jerked left and a wave of muddy water washed over them.
 

“Jesus Christ, that burns!” Carol squealed. Water and blood ran down her arm, and John had to steady himself. The water was only creating the illusion that she was bleeding to death.
 

But he did need to wrap up her arm, and soon. There was no way he could do that as long as the thug at the controls pushed the engine as fast as it could go.
 

He had to get him to stop.
 

The question was, how?

Liz looked back at the guy who had taken over the boat, then at the pistol, and tried to see if there were any bullets in the chamber. It was an old gun, like the kind cowboys wore on low-slung holsters in westerns. With some of them, you could see the chambers in the barrel if you caught it at just the right angle, and tell if they had a bullet nestled inside or not.
 

The boat clipped the edge of a sandbar and everyone jounced to the left. The man pulled the gun out of view while he fought to keep control.
 

Her sister Maddie gripped her arm.
 

“Where do you think he’s taking us?” Maddie said close to her ear. The whirring of the fan sounded like a pride of lions roaring.
 

“I don’t even think
he
knows,” Liz said. “He looks kinda confused. It feels like we’re just going in circles, but it’s hard to tell out here. Everything looks the same.”

Liz eyed him from head to toe, looking for any possible weakness. His close-cropped black hair was straight out of Super Cuts. He was about as thick and solid as a pro wrestler, with colorful tattoos of Chinese dragons and koi fish forming two full sleeves. She saw the tension in his jaw as it clenched and unclenched, and took special note of his prison-yard stare. This was a man who made a living out of making regular guys wet themselves with just a look. People like that weren’t accustomed to having other people challenge them, especially young girls.
 

“I saw you staring at the gun. What do you think?”

“Hard to tell. Even if it’s not loaded, do you see the size of him? He looks like he could box a bear.”

“And probably win,” Maddie added.
 

She was right, but that didn’t stop Liz from considering all the different angles they could take. Sooner or later, he would have to stop the boat. She just had to think two steps ahead.

That and stop the Italian kid next to her from copping a feel every time they made a hard turn. For now, he was a distant number two on her list.
 

Angelo’s leg touched the girl’s tan, toned thigh, and he couldn’t help thinking about how she would repay him for being the hero to get them out of this mess. Both chicks were bangin’. Shit, maybe he could get them both at the same time. Twins. Now there was an incentive to show this asshole what New Yorkers did to people who tried to fuck with them.
 

Dominic tapped his shoulder and motioned with his head to turn around.
 

The pistol had fallen out of the hijacker’s hand and lay next to the unconscious tour guide’s head.
 

All he had to do was take three steps and he could go all
Mission Impossible
on his ass. Dominic would have his back. He saw the old guy at the front look back. Their eyes met briefly, but it was enough to know that they were both on the same page. The dude’s wife was bleeding pretty bad, and Angelo would bet his left nut that he was nice and pissed and ready to stop this ride to nowhere.
 

They were in the middle of the friggin’ swamp. No one was taking shots at them…now. It was just one guy against at least three of them. Maybe the girls and the dork would jump in once things started.
 

He gave Dom a slight nod, and another to the guy in front.
 

His internal countdown began. He was going to fuck this guy’s shit up good.
 

Chapter Five

Nothing was going Rooster’s way. So much for making a big show with the pistol. That last near-wipeout had shaken his grip on the gun, and now it was at his feet. Worse yet, he saw that several of his hostages, because that’s what the police would be calling them now that word would have spread about the shooting and hijacking of the tour boat, had taken note that the gun was no longer in his possession.
 

The
Jersey Shore
guys looked like they had steroid-enhanced visions of heroism dancing in their thick heads. He caught their furtive glances at one another and the middle-aged guy in front. Little did they know that the bag had eleven more guns.

There was no way he was about to entertain even the thought of a mutiny. He remembered a safe house, off the beaten path in the Everglades National Park, that his father had shown him a few times when he was old enough to learn the family business. His dad and his partners used the house from time to time to store stolen goods or just hide out until things cooled down on the mainland.
 

It had been at least ten years since he’d last been there himself. His father and his buddies had all been killed in that shootout outside the Bank of America in Tampa eight years ago. Eight years in the swamp with no one to watch over its upkeep meant the old safe house was likely in dire shape. Seeing as there were no other options, he had to force himself to remember how to get there. Any thoughts by his hostages of trying to take over the boat and scatter his thoughts had to be put to bed, pronto.
 

Rooster reached into the bag and slipped his index finger into a trigger guard.