Shouldering back through the cabin door, I secured the end of the cable to the stern of the boat. With the other end already connected to the towfish, I wrapped the cable around the torpedo-shaped metal device twice more to make sure that it would hold.
As I held the towfish in one hand and the coil in the other, I looked forward.
Bold? More like downright crazy.
To cover myself, I let loose, firing all seven remaining rounds and emptying my magazine into the pontoon boat’s engines. As I’d hoped, one of them began to sputter and smoke, and the craft slowed, cutting the distance between us just enough for my plan to have a fighting chance.
Picking up the cable and towfish, I hustled in front of the cabin and locked in on my target. I set the cable on the deck, grabbed the device with two hands, and hurled it as hard as I could. The towfish flew from my grasp and spun through the night air. As it soared, my eyes gravitated to Jake, who was about to put me in his sights with a fresh mag jammed into his rifle.
The guy watched in awe as the towfish slammed home, rattling onto the pontoon boat’s deck just forward of the transom. The moment I saw it land, I jumped down into the cockpit, then jerked the throttle to full reverse and bolted out the door. The engines whined in protest and the craft jolted just as I dove headlong into its wake.
I splashed and spun as the dark water swallowed me whole, then kicked and surfaced in a blurry haze. Just as I broke free of the water, I heard a loud crash, followed by pounding splashes and groaning metal. I wiped the salt water from my eyes and watched as the utility boat crashed onto its side, then yanked the pontoon boat backward. Since it had already been angled back due to motoring full throttle, the extra pull was more than enough to cause the pontoon boat to flip backward, twist to its side, then tumble across the water. Pieces of the boat flew out, and water sprayed in all directions as the two boats were torn apart in a chaotic blur.
TWENTY-TWO
After a loud and turbulent couple of seconds, the chaos abated. The two boats finally settled and floated partially submerged, both sinking as water bubbled into the open spaces.
I caught my breath as I scanned the water. There was little doubt in my mind that both men on the pontoon boat had perished in the accident, but I wanted to be sure.
Seeing what had happened, Ange brought the Baia back around and motored slowly right up to me as I waved her over. I climbed up the ladder and plopped down onto the swim platform. It’d been a close call, even by our standards.
Leaving the engine idling, Ange sprang aft to look me over. Seeing that I wasn’t badly hurt or bleeding, she let out a sigh of relief.
“I missed it,” she said. “I looked forward for two seconds, and when I looked back, both boats were wrecked like they’d just been struck down by Poseidon and his trident.”
“The god of the sea didn’t make an appearance,” I assured her. “Though some form of divine intervention must’ve been on my side.”
I had a hard time believing that it’d worked so well. I’d expected the heavy towfish not to make the distance, or the cable to snap, or Jake to quickly throw the device back like a visiting team’s home run ball at Wrigley. But fortunately, none of those happened.
Ange stood expectantly, so I told her briefly what I’d managed to pull off. Her eyebrows sprang into her forehead.
“That’s a new one. Why didn’t you just shoot them?”
“You know I have a flair for the dramatic. Plus I’m not the marksman that you are.”
She chuckled. “You can try and sell that someplace else. I’m not buying it.” She paused for a moment, then smiled. “You’d said that you wanted to fish tonight. I think it’s safe to say you broke your record.”
I laughed softly, then eyed the three bullet holes in the stern of the Baia. Two had burrowed into the sunbed cushions, and the third had struck the transom, nearly adding a perfect dot above the i in Dodging Bullets. Fortunately, there didn’t appear to be any damage to the engines, but I’d check later on that evening to make sure.
“We really ought to look into changing the name,” Ange joked, shaking her head.
I grinned. Jack had told me the same thing many times before, saying that it should be called Dodges Some Bullets. But that just didn’t have the same ring to it.
My smile faded away in an instant as we heard splashing sounds coming from over by the wreckage. I stood on the swim platform and peered out over the water. There was movement coming from the upturned pontoon boat. It had flipped wildly at forty knots, but someone managed to sneak away with his life. And I had a good idea who.
Ange powered us over to the wreckage, then splashed right up to what remained of the pontoon boat. Jake was bloodied and severely injured, his clothes tattered. But he pulled himself slowly out of the water, sliding onto the underbelly of his wrecked boat and shooting me a sinister gaze.
With my Sig long gone, I strode toward the secret compartment in the cockpit with my spare inside.
“Take the helm,” Ange said, withdrawing her Glock and training it on Jake.
