Dead Men's Dust

broad chest. It took only two further paces before it collapsed. It didn't even offer a startled yelp before it died. Stunned, the man stared down at his dog. Eyes pools of bewilderment, he looked back at Cain who was rising from his crouch.

    'Don't like dogs,' Cain said.

    The man's gaze traveled the length of Cain's arm, fixed on the ultimate point. The scaling knife was almost devoid of blood, so quick and easy was its entry and exit.

    'They're competition,' Cain said. 'For your bones.'

    'Oh,' the man said, his knees buckling at the same time.

33

the last time i was on a motor launch it was at night and I was being deposited on a deserted beach in the Indian Ocean. I was part of an eight-man team sent to extradite suspected terrorists who'd been holed up there since a predawn attack on a village full of women and children.

    On that occasion I didn't take too much notice of my surroundings. It was an in and out, a smash and grab mission that left no time for sightseeing.

    Now, standing on the prow of the launch, I took the time to feel the spray of the ocean on my face, to smell the tang of brine in my nostrils and feel the wind in my hair. The Bailey motorboat was riding high on the ocean, lifting majestically with each swell, dipping down with each trough. I stood with my legs braced against the motion, but neglected to reach for the handrail.

    'If you close your eyes and hold out your hands it feels like you're flying,' Rink said from behind me.

    I snickered at the image. 'Start singing like Celine Dion and I'll throw you overboard,' I promised him.

    Rink grunted, moving up next to me. He leaned forward and rested his meaty forearms on the guardrail. 'What makes you think they've headed south?'

    'Just a feeling,' I said.

    'A feeling? What? Like a sixth sense or something?' Rink wasn't kidding. Like most soldiers, he knows there's a force out there that isn't tangible in the proper sense. Many a soldier's life has been saved by an enhanced sense that borders on the supernatural. Something that warned him about the concealed tripwire or sniper lying in ambush. Some argue that it's simply a product of supercharged adrenaline and a keenly trained eye, but I believe there's more to it than that. It's more than the creeping-flesh sensation that unseen eyes are watching you. But the feeling I was referring to had nothing to do with that or any other power. It had simply to do with deduction.

    'No, a feeling that if I was in their shoes I'd've headed south, too.'

    'If they survived.'

    'There's no doubt about it, Rink. Whoever this guy is that John's with, he knows his stuff. Only someone with training goes onto a yacht full of armed men and ends up blowing it and everyone aboard to shit.'

    'Unless he's got the other important ingredients: he's as crazy as a bag of weasels, has more balls than sense, and he's the luckiest goddamn son of a bitch on the planet.' Rink raised his shaggy brows, inviting disagreement.

    I shrugged, moving to join him at the guardrail. Below us, the bow wave split like blistering phosphorus against the deep aqua of the ocean. 'Maybe he has both,' I said. 'The training and the other ingredients. He had a get-out plan. You can bet your life on it.'

    'So it stands to reason,' Rink acquiesced, 'that he heads out to sea to avoid the cordon of blue lights converging on the harbor.'

    'Coast guard has their base to the north. It's what I'd've done,' I told him, and Rink nodded in agreement.

    'So who is this guy? You think it really is this Harvestman the media's screaming about?'

    'Has to be,' I said. 'It'd explain why John's fingerprints turned up in connection with the killings of that couple at the motel. Somehow, John's got himself into something way beyond his ability to get out of. Only thing I can't fathom yet is what part he's playing in all this. I can't believe he'd be a willing participant to murder.'

    Rink said, 'Maybe you don't know John the way you think you do.'

    'You keep saying that. Maybe you're right, Rink, but until I'm proved wrong, I prefer to give him the benefit of the doubt.'

    'Fair enough,' Rink said. 'But what if he has turned, Hunter? What if your brother has acquired a taste for blood? What if he's a goddamn willing participant?'

    I didn't answer for a moment, my gaze fixed on the horizon. Like the point where the sky and ocean met, my reason blurred into a haze of nothingness. Finally, I turned to Rink and saw that he was studying me with an intensity common to him. I blinked slowly, breaking the connection. 'If that's the case, it puts a whole new slant on my purpose for finding him.'

    Rink nodded sagely, lifted a hand, and placed it on my shoulder. 'Let's hope it doesn't have to come to that, huh?'

    A shout from behind us broke my melancholy and I turned to squint back at the skipper who was at the wheel of the boat.

    He was pointing with excitement toward the shore. A little more than five hundred yards away I saw what he indicated. To me, it was nothing more than one more boat tied to a short pier.

    Together, Rink and I made our way back to the skipper's cabin. He was grinning. 'The dinghy over there,' he said with an exaggerated nod of his head. 'It's from the Morning Star.'

    'The Morning Star being one of the yachts moored in the harbor?' I asked.

    The skipper snapped his fingers, then pointed a gnarled digit at me. 'Got it in one.'

    'How can you be sure?' Rink asked.