to tow through the water, even if the vegetation did seem to constantly tangle round our limbs.
Suddenly, my feet hit the muddy bottom and then I, like Lonnie, was half-swimming half-staggering with my burden towards the relative safety of the trees.
I still hadn’t caught sight of Sean or Keith and that in itself scared me. Not that I cared what happened to Keith, which I recognised wasn’t the best attitude for a bodyguard. It was always Trey who’d been my responsibility and I was determined to do my damnedest to save him now.
I glanced behind me. The light levels were dropping fast but I could still make out the collective hump in the water where the alligators were feeding. More of them were gathering all the time until I couldn’t count the numbers.
And, even though I couldn’t see it, I could certainly hear the airboat circling back towards us. The trees were almost within reach now. I shoved Trey on faster, slipping in my haste, going down on my knees and taking in another lungful of rancid gloop.
Blinded and gasping, I felt a pair of hands grab hold of the back of my shirt and the seat of my trousers and lift me clear of the water. I began to struggle instinctively until Sean’s voice said, “Be still!” in a savage whisper.
He dragged me through a small gap in the trees, and Trey after me. I got to my feet slowly, coughing and retching until there was only air in my lungs again. And not much of that.
On the other side of the trees the area opened out slightly into a pool of fly-blown water with shallow-sloping muddy banks. The trees were close in on all sides, making it darker in there than out on the open swamp.
I squinted suspiciously at a number of dark knobbly stumps protruding out of the pool until I realised they were part of a root system. They stuck up about six inches out of the water and would, at least, be enough to stop the airboat being able to force its way into our sanctuary.
Then, on the other side of the pool, I noticed the elongated shapes of three medium-sized alligators, drawn up on the far bank like beached canoes, watching us unblinkingly.
Keith and Lonnie were standing up to their knees in the water, watching the reptiles and brandishing ripped- out branches just in case any of them decided to make a move. Not that the rotting timber would have lasted long against something with the speed and agility of a hungry ‘gator. For the moment, though, both sides seemed willing to accept the uneasy standoff.
Keith was shaking so hard I’m amazed he could keep hold of his branch, let alone manage to remain at his post. Lonnie looked calmer, cradling his mangled right arm carefully across his body.
“Where’s Jim?” Lonnie asked over his shoulder.
I shook my head. “I don’t know,” I said. “He went into the water but I didn’t see what happened after that.”
Sean didn’t comment, just kept low and peered out through the undergrowth at the airboat. He had mud on his face as makeshift camouflage cream and was blending in to his surroundings perfectly. Something about his movements had changed, gone feral.
“Sean.” I put my hand on his arm and he turned his head just enough to look at me. His eyes were as cold and expressionless as those watching us from the far bank. I took my hand back in a reflex, as though he would have bitten me if I hadn’t moved. Whatever words I’d been about to say died in my throat.
Sean nodded out into the swamp. “There he is,” he said, clipped, and when I looked I saw him too. Whitmarsh must have been disorientated by his submersion and it had taken him a while to get himself together enough to head for cover. He was making slow progress through the congested water in the rough direction of our hide-out.
At that moment, the airboat came into view again. It seemed that Mason had managed to regain some small measure of control by this time. I don’t know what happened to Haines’s pistol, but he’d taken the Mossberg from its rack and had moved forwards to the bow. Even in the low light he spotted Whitmarsh’s white shirt against the murky water straight away and signalled Mason to change direction.
“Shit,” I whispered. “He’s going to lead them right to us.”
If he lived that long.
As if doing us a favour, Haines brought the shotgun up to his shoulder and fired. The muzzle flash was a bright spout of flame in the encroaching darkness. Whitmarsh cried out and began to flail in the water. Haines was still too far away for it to have been a killing shot. Maybe that was what he’d intended.
I felt a hand slip into mine and hold on tightly. It was Trey.
“For God’s sake, you can’t just leave him out there,” Lonnie said, his voice hoarse. “He saved your goddamn lives.”
Sean shot him a vicious glance but said nothing. There wasn’t much he could say, not when Lonnie was right.
Mason began to circle Whitmarsh, passing within a dozen metres of us as he did so. The wash broke over the trees roots and swept into the pool so we had to brace to keep our feet. The Chevy engine sounded almost on its last legs. Mason was having to coax it along and, after Lonnie’s wild shot, it was clearly costing him.
“Leave him and let’s go back,” he called to Haines, his voice scratchy with pain. “We need to go get the other boat. This one’s gonna die on us any minute and then we’ll be stuck out here. And I need to get fixed up. Jesus man, this hurts.”
“If we don’t finish this now, we’ll lose ‘em,” Haines shouted back. “Just keep driving the damned boat.”
“Wait until they come round again, then we’ll go out behind them,” Sean said quietly to me.
I nodded, disengaging my hand from Trey’s with some difficulty. Whatever Whitmarsh might have done, we couldn’t sit back and let Haines slaughter him.
“Wait a minute, you can’t go out there!” Keith protested. “You’ll get us all killed.”
“Oh for fuck’s sake, Dad, shut up,” Trey hissed. “They’re professionals.”
Keith opened his mouth, shut it again, and fell silent.
Haines fired another shot at Whitmarsh. He was close enough for it to have been a final one, close enough to make the water erupt and boil near his head, but Haines was playing with him now, making the older man suffer for his crimes. The airboat came round again and this time Sean and I slipped into the water in its wake.
I struck out for Whitmarsh, reaching him in half a dozen strokes. Haines’s first shot had taken him in the side and shoulder and he was losing blood fast enough to be fading. I rolled him over onto his back to stop him drowning, trying not to think about the irresistible taste of meat he was putting into the water.
Haines spotted me and gave a cry of triumph.
“Still trying to play the bodyguard, huh, Charlie?” he jeered, leaning out towards me over the side of the boat. “Well, you can’t save everybody. In your case, you can’t save anybody.” And he started to bring the shotgun up.
But just as he took aim the V8 gave its final rattling splutter and stalled. In the unearthly silence that followed I realised I could hear another engine. It could only be another airboat. Close and closing.
Haines realised it too. He whirled round, eyes scanning the darkness of the swamp.
And, as if waiting just for the split-second of his distraction, a dark shape burst out of the water next to Haines. It knocked him straight off his feet and dragged him over the side of the boat.
Twenty-five
The element of surprise Sean achieved was absolute. Haines didn’t even have time to gasp as he went under. Mason was the one who got to shout but, wounded and unarmed, there was little more he could do.
A moment later the two of them broke the surface again, fighting over the shotgun which Haines had kept a tight hold of despite the shock of the attack. He was putting up a ferocious struggle but he’d been trained as a policeman, where Sean had been trained as a soldier and there was a big difference.
Besides, Sean had passion driving him on. A cold hard flame of rage that made him far more deadly and more dangerous.
I heaved Whitmarsh closer to the tree-line, then abandoned him to Keith and Trey’s care and waded back towards the two men. I was in time to see Sean yank Haines close and headbutt him. Haines’s nose broke with an
