“I told my father it wouldn’t work. We should have just—”
“Credit where it’s due, it was a close thing,” Hawke said. “We almost bought it. Lucky for me, I had a splendid copilot aboard. Look here, I don’t have time for this rubbish. You hijacked this boat up in Maine, got the owner to bring you down here and then your gun went off in his face. Why?”
The boy suddenly reached inside his slicker and Hawke put another round approximately one inch from his left ear. Maybe less.
“On your feet. Get your bloody hands up,” Hawke said. When the youth did as he was told, Hawke added, “Now, both hands at the collar. Easy. Rip open the Velcro. One smooth motion, all the way open, thank you.”
Savalas did as he was told and Hawke saw it wasn’t a gun he was going for. He was wearing a heavy webbed vest strapped about his middle, pouches stuffed with thin flat bricks of Semtex. Suicide bombers in every little village and vale, Hawke thought.
“Your idea is quite good, really.” Hawke said. “Your darkened and disabled vessel drifts into Blackhawke’s vicinity. An SOS comes over our radio. We respond. Take you aboard, trusting souls that we are. Boom. We all go to Paradise.”
“It gets even better,” a second man said, standing in the now open doorway of the forward cabin. Tall and dark, wearing greasy coveralls, he was an older, greying version of the deputy. This was the father. The mechanic who worked out at the airfield. The man had a second MAC-10 aimed at Hawke’s head. “Please to drop your weapon,” he said, with a lightly inflected American accent. “Kick both guns over here.”
Hawke complied.
“Kerim, take the guns.”
“Kerim is it, Nikos? Well, Kerim, ask Daddy how could it get any better than this?” Hawke said, kicking the Browning away. He was already calculating the angles, whether to roll right or left, go low or high, which one to take out first, which of them might possess the better reaction time, how many seconds it would take to—
“Kerim! Show this impious Englishman the little surprise we have planned for him tonight! We were just putting the final touches on it, yes? Now, he’s a member of his own surprise party. Enough talk! Hands on your head!”
Kerim tossed the stubby machine gun to his father, keeping the Browning auto on Hawke. The younger man then stepped back beyond the square hole in the floor, motioning Alex forward with his free hand. Alex got to his feet and advanced three of four steps to the open hatchway. The father was moving around behind him, had the flashlight on him. The kick, when it came, hard and into the small of Hawke’s back, was not unexpected. Hawke pitched forward, headfirst into the hatch.
What was not expected was the blur of Hawke’s extended right hand, locking around Kerim’s wrist, his gun hand, and pulling the would-be suicide bomber down through the hatch with him, the two of them landing arms and legs akimbo, Kerim’s body atop his own, shielding Hawke, for the moment, from the machine gun the man standing above him had aimed at his heart.
“Looks like your son’s going to beat me to Paradise,” Hawke said. “If you decide to shoot me, I mean.”
“Say your prayers,” the older man shouted into the hold.
“The devil I will!” Hawke replied.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Miami
STOKELY JONES AND ROSS SUTHERLAND ARRIVED AT MIAMI International on American 170 from Boston at three-thirty on a hot, humid Saturday afternoon, the fifteenth of June. There were enormous purple clouds stacking up to the southwest, first heralds of the big tropical storm coming up from the Caribbean.
Alex Hawke had dropped them off earlier that morning at Logan. The boss was going to refuel and fly his seaplane back to Nantucket for a big powwow with some State Department honchos. He didn’t look good, and Stoke had told him to get some sleep. “You don’t want to drink whiskey, fine,” Stoke called to him as he walked back across the tarmac toward Kittyhawke. “Take sleeping pills. You can’t stay awake forever.”
The two men had been in Miami for maybe ten minutes and both of them, standing on the curb outside in the sun, waiting for the driver, were drenched in sweat.
“See, Ross,” Stoke said, “you forget all about this tropical shit.” A black Lincoln Town Car pulled up beside them. The driver, in pearl grey livery, white shirt, black tie, and heavy dreadlocks, jumped out, popped the trunk, and opened both rear doors.
“Forget about what?”
“All this damn humidity,” Stoke said, as they climbed into the back seat of the limo. “Feel like you walking around underwater. Like you some kind of damn merman or something. Merman, that’s the opposite of mermaid, case you didn’t know.”
“I was aware of that, actually.”
“Good. ’Cause they lot a people walking around that don’t know that,” Stoke said. The driver got behind the wheel and nosed out into the heavy airport traffic. “How you doin’, brother?” Stoke asked.
“Good, mon,” the driver said, his smile matching his lilting Jamaican accent. “Jah has blessed us with another golden day in paradise, yes, mon!”
“Jah must like it hot,” Stoke said, gazing out at the sun-blanched palm trees and tropical vegetation. “Miami. Jamaica. Bahamas. You don’t hear too much about Jah, you get up in places like Iceland and Alaska, places like that.”
“Jah is everywhere, mon, some people too blind to see is all. My name is Trevor, by de way.”
“Stokely Jones, pleased to meet you, Trevor.”
“Detective Inspector Ross Sutherland, Trevor,” Ross said, “New Scotland Yard.”
Stoke gave Ross a knowing smile, guessing why he’d added his occupation.
“Yeah, Trevor,” Stoke said. “We cops, just so you know. Don’t be selling us no ganja weed, ’less we have to bust your ass.”
“Don’t smoke de herb, don’t drink de rum. I’m a preacher,” the driver said, smiling in the rearview. “Preach de word of Jah. Ras Tafari. De Lion of Judah. De King of Kings. De Emperor of—”
“Okay, okay, Preacher, I know the cat. Ethiopian. Question is, do you know where the Delano Hotel is?”
“Mon! Everybody know de Delano! Famous! Movie stars, football players! You sure you not a famous football player, Stokely, mon? I recognize you. You Tiki Barber.”
“Tiki Barber,” Stoke laughed, elbowing Sutherland. “Cat ain’t half as tall, half as big, half as good-looking as me.”
“You look famous, mon, is all I sayin’.”
“I was famous for about nine minutes,” Stoke said, laughing. “Shortest career in NFL history. Badass linebacker for the Jets. You blink, though, you missed my ass. Missed my whole career. Got hurt bad first quarter, first game. First game was my last game.”
“Intercepted two passes and ran both back for touchdowns before he got hurt, however,” Ross said. “I’m quite sure he’s got the videotape of the two picks with him if you’d care to see it.”
Half an hour later, having taken the Venetian Causeway across Biscayne Bay to 17th Street, the Lincoln hooked a right on Collins and pulled into the circular drive of South Beach’s most famous white Art Deco hotel. Sure enough, Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt, both wearing white Bermuda shorts and matching knee socks, opened the rear doors simultaneously and welcomed Ross and Stokely to the Delano. Hell, Stoke thought, even the damn valet parking guys looked like movie stars.
“Preacher,” Stoke said, slipping the Jamaican a twenty, “Me and Ross going to be looking into some stuff around this town. You remember hearing about some SWAT guy getting whacked here in South Beach few weeks ago?”
“Yes, Tiki, mon. All over de papers. Ain’t found de guy did it, but I know where dey should be looking, mon.”
“Yeah? Where’s that, Preacher?”
“De Crazy House, mon! Who else but a stone crazy going to break into a SWAT guy’s apartment middle of de
