Nobody fired on the boss. Alicia never knew for what reason; she assumed because he was the object of conversation for Jensen, but his position between two shooters and Healey and Caitlyn helped save their lives.
Jensen raised the Glock.
Crouch bounded, still fleet of foot despite his age, and caught Jensen’s gun hand. The two came together struggling hard. Ex-SAS training brought to bear on both sides, and neither was better. Both men fell to their knees.
Alicia wrenched her eyes away from the individual battles and focused on her own. Russo had finally started to focus, and wounded their opponent. Alicia jumped upright and emptied her magazine into the man before he could react further. Russo followed her. Over to the right, Healey and Caitlyn slipped among the rubble, falling hard as more shots rang out. The shots arrived a moment later than both Alicia’s and Russo’s however, so ended up being aimed at the clouds as the shooters fell over backwards, already dead.
Alicia put two slugs into the dirt beside Jensen’s left knee.
“Game’s up, fool.”
She didn’t add but thought: At last.
Jensen eyed her and the others and then sighed loudly. He gave up his battle with Crouch and his grip of the gun.
“We solved nothing,” he said wearily. “Nothing.”
“You can recite that lament whilst you rot in jail.”
“A lament? Yes, I have failed.”
Alicia watched as Crouch moved back and Russo went over to help Healey and Caitlyn gain their feet. Both were bruised and sported small cuts but were otherwise okay.
She now saw the approach of local authorities, noticed the destroyed cathedral once more, and winced.
“Crap, this is gonna take some explaining.”
Crouch shook his head. “That just won’t work,” he said. “We’d better start running.”
CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT
Hours later, the running stopped.
Outside the new Panama City they found a refuge, a small clearing among the trees of a dense forest. Of course, Crouch could never go against the authorities; it would besmirch his reputation and endanger that which he loved the most — the treasure hunt — so he made sure to call people in authority that might be best placed to ease the team’s way forward. The calls took time and then those people had to make more calls which also took time.
Hence, the team’s decision to find a safe haven.
Alicia found herself wondering if it might be time to return to her primary team, and her new boyfriend, now that the bulk of the quest was out of the way. She felt a heap of disappointment, but also a little excitement at the thought of seeing Drake and the others again. She sat back on a blanket as Healey started a campfire and Russo took first watch. The night was black above, studded with twinkling pinpricks of light, and a thin sliver of moon barely crested the tops of the trees. A faint, fresh breeze played between the branches of trees and fanned the flames of their little fire.
Crouch finally returned from making his raft of calls.
“That’s about all I can do,” he said hopefully. “We have until morning.”
Healey sat back and put an arm around Caitlyn. “For what? I mean, what’s next? This is our third failure in a row.”
“Look, cheer yourself up,” Alicia said. “Take Caitlyn into the trees for ninety seconds or so. Come back with a smile on your face.”
Healey ignored her, but sent a smile toward his girlfriend. Alicia thought she’d maybe lightened his mood and wondered if Russo might want a little company.
Then Crouch addressed the other member of their party. “So, Jensen? What happened to the final strongbox?”
The thin, dark-haired man held up his hands, rattling a pair of cuffs. “Take these off first.”
Alicia chortled. “The stupidity is strong in this one.”
“Do you know how many men you led to their deaths?” Crouch asked. “How much your little quest cost? How many ancient keepsakes you lost? You should take this chance to make some amends.”
“It’s still there,” Jensen finally said. “Beneath the ruins. I have no use for baubles.”
“Had,” Alicia corrected. “You’re all washed up, crazy man.”
“It can’t be over,” Jensen rambled on. “It doesn’t end this way. There has to be a treasure. Morgan wouldn’t make all those damn maps for no reason.”
“Where are the originals?” Crouch asked.
“Same place,” Jensen said. “I left them in the car.”
“And where is the base of your operations?”
“I won’t tell you that. It has nothing to do with Henry Morgan. Does it not strike you as strange, Michael, that we have found not the barest hint of real treasure?”
It did. Alicia could see it in the boss’s eyes. Crouch made a point of fixing a sandwich into Jensen’s hands. The two men sat opposite and bolt upright, eyeing each other.
Alicia sensed trouble brewing. “What are you doing?”
“A little man to man,” Crouch said. “That okay with you?”
“That’d take two men. Not a liar and a cheat.”
Crouch looked hurt. Healey stared as if missing the point, which he did. Alicia waved it all away.
“Do what you must. I’ll be out of here in the morning.”
“We should talk first.”
Alicia wrestled with it briefly. “Maybe.” She wondered if she owed him at least that much.
Crouch then addressed Jensen. “In one aspect I do agree with you. There has to be a treasure. It’s not at the bottom of the ocean unless it sank aboard one of the few ships of Morgan’s that were never found, which I find a little coincidental. So where is it? Why draw these maps alluding to a large hoard if all he wanted to do was pinpoint the… baubles. It doesn’t make sense.”
“And the unquestionable fact is — there was a large hoard,” Jensen said. “It’s a documented history.”
Alicia drifted somewhat as they talked back and forth. She tried to ignore the part where she thought Jensen acted an awful lot like Drake. She didn’t agree with the polite questioning, or especially the humanization of Jensen, almost promoted to the level of equals, and found her mind wandering. It had been a little while since she took a look at the new self she was trying to embrace. Alicia of old was a tearaway, a sunset runner that never looked back and never cared much beyond the next dawn. If a problem arose she left it at her back, often crying for help. Then something — be it age or circumstance — had changed all that and made her realize that life could only be lived to the full by staying put, by confronting every challenge and rising above it. Part of that was why she had again agreed to help the Gold Team out; another part to find the answer to Beau’s final riddle.
Had any of it helped?
She thought not. But it was good that she was still here and not a speck on the horizon. It was good that she had no desire to leave immediately. And it was especially good that she still felt willing to hear more of Crouch’s explanation.
She zoned back in on the conversation.
Crouch had been flinging his maps to the ground. “Every last one a dead end. None interlinked. If you know something, Jensen, you’d best come clean now.”
“You think I would be here, and at Viejo and all the others if I wasn’t following the same fruitless trail as you?”
“So what’s left?” Crouch conversed amiably with the criminal as they both sipped from bottles of water.
“Jail time,” Alicia interjected harshly, purposely. “And plenty of it.” She didn’t want this thug to feel comfortable.
Jensen gave her a hard look. “This is Panama,” he said.
Alicia frowned. What did he mean? She knew exactly where they were and the extent of American influence. Before she could question him further though, Crouch had again taken up the thread of their discussion.