So he’d known about the quicksand. Pretty good trap. Shit, you had to give him credit for that at least. The guy sat down on the mound of grass, his legs crossed under him, smiling at Stoke, cradling the big silver magnum in his lap. Chilled. Happy. Like he was waiting on the perfect sunset down at Pier House on Key West. Wouldn’t leave till it had gone all the way down. Then he’d ooh and aah and go have a margarita at Sloppy Joe’s.
Stoke’s mind was racing as he tried to stifle all the bad stuff he remembered about quicksand. More you struggle, worse it gets, he knew that. Saw a scary movie when he was a kid and he could see it now. Guy in Africa in a situation just like this. Guy kept his nose sticking up till the end—his mouth filling up with muck so he couldn’t scream anymore. Then, nothing but a couple bubbles on the surface.
“Hey. I got an idea. See that old Cypress branch? That’ll reach. Then we can have us a fair fight.”
“I don’t give a fuck about fair.”
“I forgot. The brave bride killer.”
“How is your amigo? Hawke? Still in mourning?”
“You help me get out, we’ll talk all day long.”
Stoke had managed to eject the Glock’s empty mag without the guy seeing it. Sank instantly, sucked down. You could feel the pull. Strong. Had to be fed by an underground spring. Even if he managed to reload and shoot this evil bastard, it was all over anyway. He was going down. He knew that. Seen this movie, pal. The hero dies in the end.
I can live with that, Stokely suddenly thought. What the hell, you know? It even made him smile. Business he was in, your number’s bound to be up one day, why not this one? Good as any. Just don’t go out all by yourself, Stoke. No matter what. You do that, you just break Alex Hawke’s heart one more time. One way or another, you got to take this dirtbag along for the ride. Headed my way? Step right in.
“What’s so funny, senor?”
“You, that’s all. Instead of running Cuba, you running from me, bigshot. You know who saved Fidel? Who got him out of your hostage hacienda? You’re looking at him. I’m one half the reason all those Navy Super Hornets bombed all you little banana republican dictator assholes into oblivion. That’s right. Alexander Hawke and Stokely Jones, Jr., we the ones teach you not to fuck with the US of A, dickhead.”
Rodrigo del Rio laughed out loud.
“You want me to end it, huh? Is that it? Shoot you, no?”
“Not really. I plan to live a short and happy life.”
While he was lecturing Scissorhands on politics of the Caribbean he’d slipped the fresh mag into the Glock’s grip with just a soft click. Didn’t see any eye movement from the guy, not a flicker. Good. Muck was now climbing up near his waist. Bad. Not a whole lot of time here. Extremely unfortunate situation you find yourself in, Stokely.
“Ask you a couple questions,” Stoke said, finger lightly on the trigger, waiting for his moment. “You Catholic? Iglesia Catolica?”
“Si.”
“I’d spit, but why waste good saliva? Your mamma back in Cuba, she know you killed a bride? At a church? How do you possibly go any lower than that? Tell me something. Back in England. You aiming for Hawke? Or Vicky? Which?”
The guy laughed. “I am not Cuban. Colombian, Senor. From Cali. We Colombians kill the circle around the center. The bride was first because I knew she would cause the most pain. What better place to kill her than on the steps of the church? She was first. Hawke will be last.”
“Really? So who’s supposed to be next?”
“You, of course. Why do you think you’re here?”
“You ain’t that smart.”
“No? I knew one of you would come. Avenge the bride. I knew it was you who saved that fucking Castro’s life, no? Twenty years ago, Fidel disappeared my family and put me in a hole. I lived in the hole for twelve years. No sunlight, no artificial light. Ever. He did this to my eyes. Twelve years in blackness, this is what happens. But I got out and I was going to bury Fidel in that very hole. I was close. And then you and this man Hawke, you ruin everything.”
“Yeah, we got a bad habit of doing that,” Stoke said. He raised the Glock and fired as he said it. “Messing with people’s long-range plans.”
Shit.
“You missed,” Scissor said, unhurt, and pulled the trigger of the .357.
Stoke’s shoulder exploded in pain, tissue and bone blown away, and his gun smacked in the muck close enough to reach. He tried to grab it but he couldn’t move his arm and, besides, the damn gun sank instantly. What the hell? He’d missed? He never missed. Glock sounded funny when it fired. Mud in the muzzle maybe. Wasn’t his day, but, hell, it was still early.
Stoke looked at the guy, sitting there with the smoking .357, pulling the hammer back again. Cocky. He could see the guy trying to decide what would be more fun, shooting him in a lot of non-lethal places or just watching him sink.
“That must hurt, eh?” Rodrigo said.
“Hey, look!” Stoke said suddenly. “Here comes the dead guy. Why don’t you ask him yourself?” Stoke grabbed his right shoulder with his left hand. Bones felt okay. It was just a flesh wound but it was bleeding like hell and the muck was creeping up over his ribcage and the new bullet hole in his shoulder made him forget all about the one in his leg. That, and the fact that—
“Oldest trick in the book—” the guy was saying when Ross hit him high, square between the shoulder blades and drove Rodrigo forward, not stopping, pumping his legs, shoving him into the quicksand not six feet from Stokely.
The guy started screaming, flopping around. Digging his own grave, which would save Stoke a lot of trouble.
“ ’Bout damn time,” Stoke said to Ross.
“Sorry. Just woke up,” Ross said. He picked up the Cypress branch and it was just long enough.
“You just about burned beyond recognition.”
“I got blown up.”
“Looks like it.”
“Senor, I beg you!” Scissor screamed. He was up to his waist already. “Save me—”
“Save you?” Stoke said, whipping around furiously and looking at him dead in the eyes, one last time. “Save you?”
“Please!”
“Ain’t nobody can save you, Rodrigo. Take a good look at yourself. You going straight to Hell. And you halfway there already.”
It took the man with no eyes a long time to die. He flapped his arms back and forth, making snow angels in the muck, but it didn’t help much. He was going down all right, just as Stoke had told Ross he would, back at Vizcaya. Stokely and Ross sat on the clump of dry grass and watched. He pleaded and begged for a while. In the end, all that was still showing was the tip of his nose, just like in that movie about Africa that Stoke saw when he was a little kid.
He was there, and then a half-second later he wasn’t. Right after that, the exact same two little bubbles from the jungle movie.
Pop. Pop.
“You hurt?” Stoke finally asked Ross.
“A little. Heard him coming. Slipped over the side. Tried your reed-breathing technique. It worked okay until the ammo went up and blew me out of the water. You?”
“Couple of boo-boos, that’s all.”
“I don’t think you need your cummerbund anymore. You could tie that around your leg.”
“Good idea. Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it.”
