Jack, at least, had not used her love and trust to lure her into a death trap. Only her husband had been capable of that.
He’s sick, she thought in time with a confused rush of emotions: rage, grief, pity.
Then she shook her head. It wasn’t sickness. Steve was suffering from no delusion; he knew who she was and what she ought to mean to him; and he had tried, repeatedly and cold-bloodedly, to put a bullet in her back.
Had it all been a lie, then? Every moment of their years together? Every smile, embrace, kiss? Every shared secret and whispered confession?
“God…” She began to say the familiar words of her private mantra, but strength failed her. The curse, unfinished, became a kind of desperate prayer.
Crying, she staggered on through weeds and scrub, lashed forward by one thought.
The runabout.
Hidden somewhere.
Perhaps at the cove.
Jack shrugged off Steve’s nylon jacket and slung it into the water with an angry swing of his arm. The eyeglasses followed, vanishing with a splash.
His ruse had nearly worked. If Kirstie had advanced just a few steps nearer…
No point in thinking about that. He would have to try again, that was all.
He checked the Beretta’s clip. Eight rounds left, plus another in the chamber. Plenty of ammo.
Though he hadn’t handled a gun in years, he was confident enough of his ability to hit a stationary target at reasonably close range. As a teenager he had often borrowed his father’s Heckler amp; Koch. 45-well, taken it without permission, actually-and driven out to the woods, where he would practice for hours, unobserved.
He’d been a good marksman then. But now, when it mattered-when he’d meant to pay back that little bitch for the bloody hole in his leg-his every shot had gone wide of the mark.
The stab wound, at least, had almost stopped its painful throbbing. Before leaving the house, he’d inspected the injury, then wrapped his thigh in a strip of bedsheet to stanch the blood. He could walk without limping now.
He turned his attention to the motorboat, fully submerged at last, dragged to the bottom by the weight of the Evinrude outboard. Through the crystalline water its outline shimmered faintly, blurred and strange, a ghost vessel in a dream.
Kirstie wouldn’t be getting away in that boat, anyhow.
Only the runabout was left. Steve, of course, knew where it was concealed, but Jack was unconcerned about him. His energy had been fading fast. By now the sedative in his system must have put him under.
And Kirstie had no idea where to find the runabout. Still, she was certain to try. Where would she look first?
The cove.
Obviously. The cove was where the boat had been beached in the first place. Probably she was on her way there right now.
Waiting for the boat to founder had cost him time. She had a head start. But he could catch up.
And when he did, his next bullet would not miss.
36
Where the forest trail met the coral beach, Steve found what he was looking for.
He had spotted it ten days ago, on an aimless walk with Anastasia. The borzoi, like all dogs, had liked to sniff everything within reach; but when she’d started nosing a waist-high shrub with scarlet flowers and yellow fruits, Steve had pulled her hastily away.
Jatropha multifada. The physic-nut tree.
Easy enough to recognize the species. Jack, in fact, had first identified it to him when they vacationed on the island together. Varieties of Jatropha grew throughout south Florida; one of them, native to Key West, was known by locals as “the bellyache bush.”
An appropriate name for any of the Jatropha species, which collectively were responsible for dozens of accidental poisonings every year. The tempting, candy-colored fruits were irresistible to children; the seeds within the fruits contained a purgative oil similar to the ricin found in castor beans.
As little as two seeds could produce symptoms of gastroenteritis within a few hours. The larger the quantity, the faster the onset and the more severe the effects. A large enough dose could prove fatal.
Crouching by the bush, Steve plucked a small yellow capsule of fruit from the nearest branch. With trembling fingers he tore it open, plucked three seeds from the cavities.
He raised them to his lips. Hesitated.
You sure you want to do this, Stevie?
The voice, strangely, was Jack’s. But the thought was his own.
A ripple of tingling cold skittered up his forearms as if in answer. A new wave of the sedative kicking in.
Goddammit, he had to get that shit out of his system. Adrenaline wouldn’t keep him going much longer.
Eyes closed, he thrust the seeds into his mouth.
They were tasteless, crunchy. He chewed, swallowed, then picked another fruit and consumed its seeds as well. A total of six so far.
How many would it take to get quick action? If he overdid it, he would face a painful, writhing death. But if he was too cautious, he wouldn’t feel the effects for hours. Hours he could hardly afford to waste, not with Jack undoubtedly hunting Kirstie at this moment, the Beretta hot in his hand.
He plucked a third fruit, ate the seeds.
Nine now. He’d heard of people dying from a dose of ten.
But other than a mild burning sensation at the back of the throat, he still felt fine.
Dammit to hell, this wasn’t going to work. Maybe he’d misidentified the plant. This might be some harmless shrub that only looked like a physic-nut. In that case he could gorge himself on seeds without effect, until the damn sedative finally put him under.
He jerked another fruit free of the branch, began to pulp it in his fingers to find the seeds, then froze, listening.
From the south end of the island, a distant crack of sound, then another, and more.
Gunshots. Four in all.
Then, rising high and breathless in the night air, Kirstie’s keening cry.
“Stop it! Stop it, you son of a bitch!”
Christ, Jack was killing her. Killing her right now.
“Hell with this.” Steve threw aside the fruit and pushed himself to his feet.
He had to save her. Had to find the strength somehow. If the seeds wouldn’t work, then he would fight off the sedative with sheer willpower. He could do it. He A sudden agonizing stomach cramp bent him double. Sparks of white glitter whirled before his eyes. They expanded, merged, bleaching his world to a spread of arctic snow.
The poison. Kicking in.
He collapsed on his side, trembling violently, as pain clamped down harder on his guts and currents of nausea raced through him like fever chills.
You ate too many of the damn things. The groaning voice in his thoughts was nearly drowned out by the hum and sizzle that seemed to fill his skull. You killed yourself, you asshole. And Kirstie, too.
Somewhere far away, a fifth gunshot sounded. He barely heard it. The noise had no reality to him. Nothing had any reality but the spasms of agony knotting his bowels.
He twisted on his belly and vomited. Again. Again.
His stomach emptied, and he was left rasping with dry heaves that shook his body.
“Oh, God,” he whispered. “Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God.”
