Mike entered the covered area first, with his gun raised. Jessica waited, crouched several paces behind her husband, watching both sides of the dock. The couple was unsure of what they were facing, and they didn’t want to get caught bunched together in case the stalkers decided to open fire.
Mike focused on the boat. Its engines had been cut, but he could hear it drifting just on the other side of the Hatteras. Suddenly, he heard a faint click. Barely noticeable to most, but to Mike’s adrenaline-amped ears, it sounded like a symbol had been crashed together to end Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture.
The cocking of a pistol’s hammer was unmistakable. Mike dropped to a knee and whispered to Jessica, “Gun!” He’d lowered his body just in time.
A spattering of gunfire sailed by where he’d been standing only a split second before. The bullets embedded in the thatched hut’s supports or flew toward the beach. Mike glanced toward Jessica, who was crouched and ready to move. With hand signals, he directed her to go left toward the bow of their Hatteras, and he tapped his chest and pointed right. The center flybridge of the yacht would serve to split their target.
Jessica moved swiftly and crouched behind a white icebox used to preserve the catch of the day. It was empty and would provide little ballistic protection, but at least she could obscure herself from view. Mike went to the opposite end of the covered dock and crouched next to one of the telephone-pole-sized dock supports that had been driven into the ocean floor. He was exposed slightly, but it enabled him to get a clean shot if the assailants broke cover.
Their boat was a simple runabout made by Wellcraft. Roughly twenty-three feet long, the inboard was more for pleasure boating than anything. It was worthless for fishing other than around the dock with light tackle.
“Donde estan ellos?” one of the men asked in Spanish. Where are they?
“Los cobardes,” the other man responded with a chuckle. Cowards.
“Si. Rapido!” a third man ordered, telling the others to move quickly.
One of the men leapt from the rear engine cover of the Wellcraft onto the aft deck of the Hatteras. Mike didn’t hesitate to show them he wasn’t a coward.
He fired two rounds toward the shadowy target. He was unable to get a better view of the man, but at fifteen feet away, Mike was a deadly shot even in the pitch-black conditions.
“Vamos! Vamos!” shouted one of the men into the dark. The inboard engine of the Wellcraft fired, and the rumble of the exhaust caused the waters to churn.
Jessica took the offensive. She jumped onto the dock’s storage box and over the yacht’s railing. She slid across the deck on her knees until she reached the other side of the boat. She fired several rounds toward the steering console of the Wellcraft. A man screamed in pain and fell over the side of the runabout into the water.
The third man returned fire in Jessica’s direction. He never had a chance. Mike had climbed aboard the Hatteras and found the silhouette of his target in front of the Wellcraft’s dash. He fired three rounds in rapid succession, two to the body and one near the man’s head. Then, with a cool demeanor, he fired subsequent rounds into the heads of each of the would-be killers to ensure the battle was over.
“Three dead!” he shouted to Jessica as he scanned the interior of the boat.
“What the hell, Mike?” Jessica was astonished the men would fire upon them without compunction.
“Hey, is everybody okay?” Hank hollered from the end of the dock. Lights from several flashlights were dancing along the beach and trying to illuminate the end of the dock.
“Yeah! Clear!” replied Mike. Then he turned to Jessica. “I guess they planned to steal the boat or strip it for parts.”
The Wellcraft was still idling, but the waves from offshore had pushed it toward the Hatteras. This allowed Jessica to get a look inside.
“Gas cans and siphon hoses,” she said calmly. “They must not have seen us on the beach. They were gonna drain our tanks.”
Mike reached for the side rail of the Wellcraft and pulled it closer to him. He jumped on board and stepped over the dead body, careful not to slip on the blood covering the once white deck. He located the keys and cut the engine.
“Jimmy, tie them off,” Hank ordered as he arrived with the Frees. Everyone on Driftwood Key began to clean up the mess left by the shoot-out. Hank turned to Mike and shined the light in his face. “Don’t criminals give it a rest, even in the apocalypse?”
Mike took a deep breath and exhaled. “Apparently not.”
Chapter Thirty
Tuesday, October 29
Key West, Florida
Serial killers were like functioning alcoholics. Their hunger for killing was every bit as strong as the drunk’s thirst for booze. The apocalypse didn’t change the insatiable needs of either the drunks or the demented.
If the Washington Post wrote an article about the most prolific serial killer in the history of the Florida Keys, they’d write that Patrick Hollister was a mild-mannered man who had a normal childhood.
His parents never divorced. Normal.
He grew up in a modest neighborhood. Normal.
He wasn’t a troublemaker in school and received good grades in all his studies. Normal.
He dated and eventually lived with a woman for a time. Normal.
He got a job as a banker and eventually became a branch manager. Normal.
Normal, normal, normal.
Only, Patrick Hollister was anything but. He’d learned he was gay when he attended the University of Florida in Gainesville. He tried to assimilate into the party scene there. College sports ruled supreme, and therefore drunken gatherings were the norm. He was a good-looking young man who seemed to attract interest from college girls, who often inquired about
