Steele was close enough to the entrance for Winters to make good on his threat if his ex-partner tried to draw a weapon.
“So what do we do now, Jim?” Steele asked, ostentatiously keeping his hands spread out by his sides. “Stand around and wait till the cavalry comes?”
“As long as you stay on this boat, you’ll have the hope of pulling something off,” Winters said. “And, knowing you, you might just succeed.”
He tensed, half-raising the wrench. “First, you can give Megan the keys to those cuffs.”
“I could just as easily be a gentleman — undo them for her,” Steele suggested, his right hand going into his pocket.
“Just the keys,” Winters repeated grimly. “If anything else comes out, you’ll regret it.”
Steele shrugged. “And I thought a few years on a desk might have softened you.” Slowly, carefully, his hand emerged, his fingers delicately holding a small ring with a couple of tiny keys on it.
“If you thought I’d have them on the same ring as the ignition for the engines, too bad.” The kidnapper grinned. “Of course, if you want to come in and search me for them and any artillery…”
Coming into the cramped cabin would bring Winters into hand-to-hand range, and he obviously didn’t want to take that chance.
“Toss the keys to Megan,” he repeated.
Steele stood with the keys in his palm. “Or what? You’ll bash in my skull a couple of times?” He shook his head. “I don’t think so, Jim. You’d never do that to an unarmed man.”
“People change.” Winters’s voice sounded like two huge rocks grinding together. “You did. Are you really willing to bet that I haven’t?”
Steele silently regarded his ex-partner for a moment. Then, without another word, he tossed the keys to Megan.
It only took a couple of seconds to undo the cuff around her wrist. Another twist of the key, and she removed the jangling bit of metal from around the bed railing.
“Okay, now we’re going out on deck,” Winters announced. “You’ll go first, Mike. Megan, I want you to stay as far as possible from his hands.”
Megan nodded. She had no idea how Mike Steele had rated in unarmed combat. But her own martial arts training was chock-full of all sorts of unpleasant holds that could disable an opponent, hold a hostage…or break a neck.
Winters waited until Steele was coming toward him before he stepped aside. He stayed at Steele’s back as Megan stepped into the open.
Steele spread his arms and took a deep breath. “Ah, that good sea air. It’ll be a perfect evening for a sail.”
“For other people,” Winters said grimly. “Not for you.”
“I truly didn’t think you’d hold so much of a grudge.” Steele almost seemed to be complaining. “You ruined my life, I took a shot at ruining yours. Okay, I lose. But I think you still owe me, Jim. Let me go, and I’m out of your life for good. I swear it. I’ll even tell you where you can find the stuff that will clear you completely. All you have to do is stroll onto the dock and let ol’ Iron Mike sail away. Come on, Jim. For old times’ sake.”
“I always wondered if I should have kept quiet when I found that Alcista was framed,” James Winters said quietly to his partner’s back.
“Things would have been a lot different,” Steele said.
“But then I wondered if there were other cases that I just never found out about.”
Steele grinned over his shoulder. “I’ll never tell.”
“But this time around, you went too far. There are three recent cases of murder to consider.”
“Two cases are people who are no great loss, and one was an unfortunate accident.”
“Three dead people,” Winters said. “I can’t let you walk away from that.” His voice hardened into cop mode. “Onto the dock. Now.”
Steele made his move as they were coming down the gangplank. He pushed Megan into James Winters, knocking his former partner off balance. While Winters grabbed Megan to keep her from falling overboard, Iron Mike vaulted over the side and landed on the dock below like a cat, drawing a pistol as he landed.
Megan froze. The gun was trained on her. Its muzzle looked more like a drainage pipe — almost large enough to crawl into.
“I’ve got her dead in my sights, Jim. Now it’s your turn not to do anything stupid.”
The wrench dropped from Winters’s hand to clatter on the metal gangplank.
“Now, if the two of you will kindly step off and get out of my way…”
The distant banshee wail of sirens cut into his words.
“Just get moving,” Steele ordered. “I think that’s my cue to go.”
“Mike, you’re not going anywhere,” Winters spoke in a rush. “Before I went to the cabin, I was down in the engine room, messing with your fuel pumps. Why do you think I had the wrench with me?”
“You always could think fast,” Steele complimented. “And I give you a ten for sincerity. Now do as I say. Get the hell out of my way.”
He extended the pistol at arm’s length, aiming at Megan.
“All right!” Winters choked. He started down the metal ramp. Megan followed, feeling an invisible target sign burn into her chest.
“Okay,” Steele said as they reached the dock. “Let’s be traditional about this. Hands up, and stand over there.”
His right hand kept the pistol leveled at Megan. His left indicated a position nearly back on land. Besides the sirens, Megan could hear the roar of heavy-duty engines. The cops or Net Force must almost be there.
“Mike, I’m not conning you,” Winters insisted as they moved where Steele wanted them. “There’s loose fuel in the engine room. Vapors could turn this whole boat into a bomb.”
“Just a gamble I’ll have to take, pardner.” Steele showed remarkable agility as he backed up the gangplank, still keeping them covered.
He just made it aboard as a fleet of cars screeched to a halt at the dock entrance.
“Police! Freeze!” an amplified voice blared as Mike Steele dived into the cockpit. He fired a couple of shots to keep the cops’ heads down while he turned the ignition key.
James Winters lunged toward Megan, grabbing her in a tackle and bringing her to the surface of the dock.
Behind them, a fireball erupted from the bowels of the cabin cruiser. Even lying flat, they could feel the shock wave tear at them. And, at the center of the blast, they heard a terrible human scream.
Flames roared around the superstructure of the vessel as Megan rose to her feet with an assist from James Winters’s arm. He tried to draw her along to the dock entrance, where a group of cops and Net Force agents stared at the sudden destruction. But Megan pulled back, her eyes on the worst of the blaze — the cockpit where Mike Steele had stood a moment before.
“He didn’t leave you hung out to dry this time,” she told her mentor. “I can testify that he confessed to killing those people. And he actually fired shots at the cops trying to stop him. We’re all witnesses to that,” she finally said. “I mean, there’s no misinterpreting that. He didn’t succeed, Captain. He’s out of your life, and he didn’t get you.”
James Winters slowly nodded, looking into the flames. “As for the rest…well, Iron Mike Steele got the Viking funeral he always wanted. End of story.”
Together, they turned away from the blazing wreckage and headed up the dock to dry land.
To safety.
