Rising Moon: A Jesse McDermitt Novel (Caribbean Adventure Series Book 19) Read online

  “We’re on the ground, Tony. There’s an old shack here and a trail leading off to the east.”

  “We just turned off the paved road a few minutes ago,” Tony said. “We could hear Charity hovering. Good thing, too. We almost passed the trail. Be there in two minutes.”

  “I’ll stay on, with my phone in my shirt pocket.”

  Tank and I advanced toward the shack, guns now raised, as we scanned both sides of the trail.

  Just as a pleading sound reached my ears, Tank froze.

  “You hear that?” he asked.

  “Coming from the house,” I said, taking the lead and jogging up the trail toward it.

  I heard the sound again, more distinct. It was a woman’s voice, crying mournfully.

  Breaking into a headlong run, I sprinted up an unstable-looking wooden bridge connected to the house.

  The imploring cries for help were clear in my head. Two women, maybe three. The thought of one of my daughters or my soon-to-be wife being held captive urged me faster.

  Time seemed to slow, as everything came into clear, sharp focus. I saw the padlock on the door, but it meant little—I wasn’t stopping to pick it, like I had Ty Sampson’s. I heard the women pounding on the wall on either side of a boarded-up window to my left, wailing for help. I heard the creaks and groans of the rickety bridge with each footfall.

  I measured each step, so I would arrive at the door pushing off with my right foot. My body was low, as I put everything into my pumping legs. I could see the weak center of the old wooden door. Below came a thrashing sound, maybe a startled gator.

  All these things, and more, flashed through my mind as I took the last step, launching my body like a missile, shoulder low.

  Two hundred and twenty pounds moving at high speed is hard to stop. I hit the center of the door and it exploded in pieces. My momentum was slowed, but not stopped, as I rolled on through the opening.

  Instantly, I came up to one knee, my right leg extended to stop my slide. I was a little groggy, but my Sig was up and moving around the small room. I’d almost slid right into a hole in the floor.

  Through an open door, I saw two women huddled in the corners of a bare room. Looking down, I saw a patch of yellow fabric floating on the surface of the water just below the house.

  Rising, I moved slowly toward the open door, angling to see the part of the room hidden from my sight.

  Tank came through the mangled doorway, quickly assessed the situation, and moved to my right to cover the part of the room where the two women were.

  “He’s not here,” the nearer woman said hopefully.

  “We’re here to help,” I reassured her.

  She looked rough, wearing a torn, light-blue blouse and a checked navy skirt, also worn and tattered. She’d recently had a black left eye. It was nearly healed, leaving a pale purpling discoloration to the area around it. Her left eye was deeply bloodshot. Tiny capillaries in the eye had burst from taking a hard right fist to the side of the head.

  I looked past her to the other woman, kneeling, her face buried in her hands. She wore cutoff jeans and a pink and gray flannel shirt, both nearly torn off and badly stained. There were bruises on both arms, just above her elbow. A part of my mind recognized the injuries caused by being forcefully pinned down.

  These women had been held captive and abused repeatedly.

  Slowly, the second woman looked up at me, an expression of hope on her gaunt features. She had a swollen lip that was healing and a scar over her left eye that had mended poorly. Her eyes were blue but somewhat vacant.

  I breathed a sigh of relief, certain it was her. “Cobie Murphy?”

  Tears welled in her eyes. “You…know my…my name.”

  I heard the sound of a car outside and pulled my phone out. It was still working. “All clear inside, Tony. We need some tools—wrenches or pliers. Whatever you have to remove bolts.”

  Tank moved toward the woman nearest the door while I crossed the room. I put my phone away and holstered my Sig as I knelt next to the frail-looking girl.

  “My name’s Jesse,” I said softly. “You know my daughter, Flo Richmond, and I’m a friend of Manny Martinez. He and your mom sent me to find you and bring you home to her. Would you like that?”

  Tank was talking to the other woman, but I was concentrating on Cobie, on how she’d react. She’d been held captive for over a month, starved, beaten, and probably raped. Charity had spoken to me openly about the shock of being abused. I remember her telling me it took a long time before she was comfortable with physical contact, even with a trusted friend. The girl before me was going to need a lot of help.

  “My friends outside are bringing something to get that chain off,” I said quietly, hearing rushed steps on the bridge. “Will it be okay with you for them to come in here and help us?”

  I could hear movement in the other room, and without taking my eyes from hers, I raised my right hand in a halt command. All movement and sound in the other room ceased.

  Her eyes went to the door in fear.

  “Those are my friends, Cobie,” I said quietly.

  Her eyes came back to mine.

  I sensed that she needed more reassurance than the other woman—reassurance that came from familiar words that carried great authority, even if she didn’t know what they meant.

  I raised one corner of my mouth in a half grin. “The big guy with the mustache is Master Chief Petty Officer Andrew Bourke. With him are Chief Petty Officer Tony Jacobs and Secret Service Agent Paul Bender.”

  Her eyes cut to the men I knew were huddled at the door, then they dropped to Tank. “Who’s he?”

  “That’s Master Gunnery Sergeant Owen Tankersley and I’m Gunnery Sergeant Jesse McDermitt. You’re going to be okay, Cobie. Nobody’s gonna hurt you anymore. You have my word on that.”

  Like an uncoiling spring, her hands reached toward me, and she fell into my arms, sobbing quietly.

  I sat next to her and let her cry on my shoulder as Tony entered the room cautiously, a toolbox in one hand.

  “Tony’s going to take that chain off now,” I said. “Will it be okay if he touches your ankle?”

  She moved her head gently against my chest and I gave Tony a nod to go ahead.

  Andrew knelt by the other woman and he and Tony went to work removing the women’s shackles.

  Paul stood in the doorway, his psychoanalytic mind taking in everything.

  We only had a few minutes. Using Quick’s phone’s GPS, Charity had found him on the interstate and was pacing him from behind and out over the Glades, out of view from his mirrors and out of earshot. She reported that he was in a big, white SUV but couldn’t confirm he was driving or even get a positive ID on the make of the vehicle.

  I walked Cobie out to the car. She and the other woman, who we now knew as Michelle Tate, squinted in the bright sunshine.

  “Cobie, I want you to go with Andrew,” I said at the back door of the sedan. “He and Paul will take you and Michelle to the hospital in Weston, on the outskirts of Miami. It’s a short ride.”

  “No,” she said forcefully. “That’s too far away from home.”

  I looked over at Paul for guidance.

  “They both seem to be physically okay,” he said. “Dehydrated and malnourished, but we can take care of that in the car. Missus Tate lives in Miami. I can take her into Weston, then Andrew can take Cobie on down to Fishermen’s Hospital in Marathon.”

  Looking into Cobie’s eyes, I asked, “Will that be all right? We just need to get you out of here before the man who abducted you gets here.”

  “You’re not coming?”

  “No,” I replied, searching for words. “I’m going to stay here with Tank and Tony to meet the man.”

  Her blue eyes bounced from one of my eyes to the other, as if searching for something. “You’re going to kill him.”

  She said it as a statement, not a question.

  “Kill him for me, too,” Michelle said, sliding into the front p
assenger seat. “And for the other women here before us.”

  “And Vanessa,” Cobie said, looking back toward the shack.

  “Vanessa?” I asked. “Vanessa Ramos?”

  “Yes,” Michelle said. “She got loose and went for help just before you arrived. We heard her scream, then there was a lot of splashing. I think the alligators got her.”

  Andrew helped Cobie into the car, then went around and got in the other side as Paul climbed in the driver’s seat and started the engine.

  “Here,” Andrew said, removing his earwig and tossing it across the roof of the car. “Beats a cell phone.”

  I caught it, wiped it clean and put it in my own ear, adjusting the bone mic around it.

  Paul turned the car around and headed in the right direction, and as they drove away, Cobie looked at me through the back window.

  Then they were gone.

  “We’re standing in the middle of the street,” Tank said. “And the kid is safe from traffic. What now?”

  “Um, I don’t see any traffic,” Tony said. “And this hardly qualifies as a street, man.”

  I faced my mentor. “Now we make it safe for other kids, so they don’t get drawn into traffic.”

  Tank looked at the busted door. “He’s gonna know someone’s been here as soon as he pulls up.”

  Paul’s voice came over my earwig. “You have an inbound bogey. A Volkswagen van, of all things.”

  “Ty Sampson,” I said, looking around, then pointing to a fallen palm across the trail from the shack. “Tony, take cover there. Tank, you go inside.”

  “What are you gonna do?” Tony asked.

  I looked past them, toward the end of the road. “I’m going to stand right over there and greet him.”

  Charity’s voice came over my comm. “The SUV is five minutes out,” she said. “What do you want me to do, Jesse?”

  “Be ready to exfiltrate,” I said. “There’s room to land just beyond the shack. I’ll tell you when.”

  We split up and I headed to a large clump of sawgrass at the water’s edge and waited. It was a good fifty yards past the shack and the sun was low and behind me. I holstered my Sig and folded the rifle’s butt stock out, locking it in position. I was good with a handgun, but better with a rifle at that distance.

  I could hear the van’s air-cooled engine chugging and wheezing as it came up the trail toward us. Finally, it rounded a turn and came into the open, rolling to a stop between Tony and Tank, oblivious to the fact that he was caught in a deadly crossfire between three highly trained marksmen.

  Ty Sampson was driving, but he had a passenger. I couldn’t tell who it was, but knew they were unable to see me, silhouetted against the sun. They both got out at the same time.

  The second man was Benito Moreno, the man I’d seen selling drugs behind the Rusty Anchor. He stepped around the passenger door and met Sampson in front of the bus.

  Neither man seemed to notice the broken door.

  “Let me handle them,” I whispered.

  Knowing that only Tony could hear me, I looked toward the shack. Tank was behind the door opening, out of their line of sight, but he could see me. I signaled him to stay where he was, and he nodded back.

  Stepping out into the open, I called out, “That’s far enough, Moreno.”

  Both men turned at the sound of my voice, recognition registering in both expressions.

  Paul’s voice came over the comm. “The girl’s talking,” he said in a whisper. “She said it was a guy named Ty who abducted her with help from a Cuban man with slicked-back hair driving a black sportscar. She also said the big man sometimes came with an older man.”

  Moreno’s hand moved quickly to his pocket. I didn’t hesitate. As his handgun started to come out, I brought the rifle to my shoulder and fired.

  A pink mist splattered against the van’s open passenger door. The impact of the round in the middle of his chest took Moreno off his feet, smashing him to the ground.

  As my barrel came back down, my hand instinctively ratcheted the bolt, extracting the spent cartridge and chambering a fresh one.

  When the scope came back into my line of sight, Sampson’s surprised face appeared in the crosshairs. Whether he was armed or not, I didn’t care.

  I pulled the trigger and sent his soul chasing after Moreno’s, straight to the fiery depths of hell where they belonged.

  It was over in two seconds, but I racked the bolt just the same, chambering another round, then quickly policed my brass, dropping the two empty cartridges in my pocket.

  Both men lay dead on the ground. I felt no more remorse than if I’d stepped on a palmetto bug. As I walked toward the van, I drew my Sig, just in case.

  There was a gaping exit wound in Moreno’s back. Sampson’s face was still intact, save for a hole in the middle of his forehead, but the rest of his skull had exploded, covering the windshield with brain tissue and blood.

  “The SUV is leaving the interstate,” Charity said.

  “What do you want to do?” Tony asked, rising from cover.

  “Tank,” I called to the shack. “You and Tony go up the trail and block him if he tries to leave.”

  Coming quickly down the steps, Tank ignored the bodies on the ground and joined Tony. The two of them hustled to where the trail came out of the overhanging mangroves.

  I went up the bridge to the house, entered through the splintered door, then went into the captives’ room. There, I pulled the rifle off my shoulder and removed the magazine, dropping it in my pocket. When I racked the bolt on the rifle, the cartridge flew out, and I caught it in midair. Dropping the Lapua round in my pocket, I then stood the rifle in the corner.

  I did the same with the Sig, cleared the chamber, and placed it on the floor by the rifle, just as I heard the sound of a vehicle outside.

  Moving intentionally, I closed the door to the room, stepped to the far corner, and stood waiting.

  I had every intention of killing Willy Quick, but it wasn’t going to be merciful, like it had been with Moreno and Sampson.

  The room he’d used to torture and abuse who-knew-how-many women suited my sense of karma perfectly. It was about fifteen-feet square. Not as big as a boxing ring, but I had no intention of adhering to the Marquess of Queensberry Rules.

  “What the hell?” I heard the big man bellow from outside.

  He’d found the bodies.

  A moment later, I heard heavy footfalls on the bridge, then cautious footsteps as he stepped past the busted door.

  I stood watching the closed door to the room. The knob slowly turned, then the door flew open.

  Willy Quick stood beyond the doorway, filling it almost completely.

  He was a giant.

  And he held a revolver in his hand, pointed in my direction.

  “You again!” he growled, stepping through the door.

  He had to lead with one huge shoulder, ducking his head slightly to clear the top of the door.

  What the hell was I thinking? This guy wasn’t another Quint Robbins, gone soft around the middle. He was at least four or five inches taller than me and more than a hundred pounds heavier. And little of it was fat.

  Still, in my experience, big guys rarely had to fight, so few ever learned how. They went through life either intimidating opponents or winning with a single blow or body slam.

  If Quick had a weakness it would be his size, which, unfortunately, also happened to be his second greatest asset—the first being the gun in his hand.

  “How’ve you been, Willy?” I asked, stepping away from the shadowy corner. “It’s been a long time. Last we met, you said if I put down my gun, I’d be no threat at all.”

  I nodded to the corner. “Both magazines removed and chambers empty.”

  His giant chest heaved, just a little more than I thought would be normal. The adrenaline and climb up the bridge had done that. His heart couldn’t beat fast enough to get oxygen to such a massive body when exerted.

  He pointed outside.
“Did you—?”

  “Yes, I did,” I interrupted him. “And the women are safe.”

  He took a step toward me, his head lowered, eyes glaring from behind his long, stringy hair.

  “I’m gonna start with your eyes,” he growled. “That way you won’t have to look at what I do to the rest of you.”

  “Many have tried,” I said. “Most recently, those two men outside.”

  He stopped his advance, considering his options. I knew he could kill me any second, but I was betting on his inner bully taking over. He glanced over at my guns.

  “They’re unloaded,” I told him again.

  “What are you doing, Jesse?” Tony’s voice came over my earwig.

  “It’s just you and me, Willy,” I said, more for Tony’s benefit than Quick’s. “Two men. No guns.”

  An evil smile spread across his face.

  “You’re certifiable, you know that?” Tony said in my ear.

  “That was a dumb decision,” he said, tossing his gun aside and lunging for me.

  I easily stepped under his ape-like arms, hammered him hard in the left kidney, then stepped back just in time to elude a wicked backhand. The swing brought him around to face me, his arms spread wide. I stepped in with an overhand right to the heart. A lesser man would have gone down from the powerful blow, but he just staggered back.

  Quick roared in anger as he turned and came at me as before, arms wide, to try to grab me. Those tree-branch arms spanned half the room and I had little doubt of the outcome if he got hold of me. I feinted the previous move and then ducked under his arms the other way. This time, I slammed his other kidney with a quick left and right.

  Stepping away, I whip-kicked him in the back of his left knee.

  Quick went down, and I followed with another whip kick to the base of his skull, then danced away once more.

  I wasn’t about to jump on him. That’d be a deadly mistake. I’d slowed him down, but not enough to where he couldn’t tear me in half if he got his hands on me.

  Willy pivoted and faced me, down on one knee and a hand but definitely not out. There was some serious rage in those eyes. It was probably the first time he’d been on the receiving end of an ass-whooping in decades, if ever. There was something else there, too.