“Quickly,” Forrester said.
“Our men?”
“Those not here are preparing the boat.”
“Excellent.”
Jensen longed for a drink; it was rare for a waking hour to pass when he didn’t savor the rich nectar, his greatest companion. How could a man endure himself more than with such fine and luxurious help? Plus, it helped him think and kept all the ghosts at bay. Jensen believed that in keeping the ghosts of his past at bay he was in fact helping his fellow man, since accepting any of that amount of retribution would produce a terrible fallout. Maybe Henry Morgan should have drunk more.
Jensen wasn’t about to part with any of his hard-earned currency. Not like Morgan. Bury it nearby? Why? To give it back later? Morgan never had. Jensen had read that Morgan started drinking himself to death as soon as he returned to Jamaica from his time in England.
Having gained a governorship, what then had he lost?
The guilt of all that plundering; the responsibility for so many innocent deaths. The remorse for a life ill-lived. Morgan had taken a different way out. He lost the will and the courage to be a survivor.
Jensen followed Labadee out of the station and toward the road. The assault had been direct and sudden. Merciless. Jensen approved. He had been taught by the other side long ago to strike hard and strike mean.
A sedan stood idling at the curb, its back door open and looking much more inviting than a jail cell. The road to the boat was a long one; the two wenches lounging along the back seat promising a distracting trip. Jensen waited as more shots rang out, preferring on this occasion not to join in with the bloodletting. There would be time enough for all that.
If Crouch found Morgan’s abandoned island.
Jensen had gambled that to make time for himself and fashion a safe getaway, a true-enough tale had to be told. So he had given them the one about the abandoned island, the refuge Morgan kept to himself; and the method in which Jensen himself had found it. Hopefully, the quest would keep them involved and Jensen would find the treasure and disappear before they figured it out.
Hopefully?
He was talking about Michael Crouch here. No way would he succeed in escaping before Crouch found the island.
So was it self-destruction? Did he want to be caught?
Or did he want to test himself against the best?
Jensen knew the answer without even thinking.
CHAPTER THIRTY ONE
Alicia exited last from the museum, her senses alert even in the sleepy building. The bright sunlight blinded her for a moment, but then she was checking the streets outside and everything in the distance. Ironically, she remembered ambushing Matt Drake somewhere near here once, a fact she had long wanted to forget, and now looked to where she had positioned her own team during the Blood King conspiracy.
Key West bumbled along happily, bright, vivid and content in its relative seclusion at the southern tip of America. The only signs of life she could see were tourists, camera-snappers munching on the local and scrumptious item of fame — Key lime pie, and old locals sitting on metal benches, staring out to sea.
Crouch led the way to a taxi rank and the team decided to slip more comfortably into two separate cabs. The drivers agreed on a route that took them away from the busy Highway 1 and through Key West’s residential suburbs, and pulled away from the curb. Alicia again assured herself that no one was following and that was when Crouch’s cellphone rang.
She felt a small tingle, sensed trouble.
Crouch stared at the screen. “Unknown caller. Hello?”
He listened for a while, gripped the bridge of his nose, and scrunched his face up. “I see,” he repeated four times and then ended with: “Any clue as to where?”
Alicia perceived that the answer was no and questioned the boss as he ended the call. “Didn’t sound like a lottery win?”
“John Jensen escaped from prison,” Crouch said with a pained exhalation. “Broke out by what they think was a ten-man team and a few insiders. There are casualties. Survivors gave chase but the man is gone.”
Alicia closed her eyes in a moment of respect and then asked the obvious. “Where’s he gone?”
“Wait.” Crouch added Caitlyn and Healey, in the other car, to a conference call and quickly brought them up to speed.
“You think he’s coming here?” Healey asked immediately. “To find the book?”
“It’s possible,” Crouch said.
Alicia saw him glance at the driver as if debating whether they should stay put. They were currently cruising past two rows of houses with palm trees waving in the gardens, white walls and white gates bordering the properties. Green refuse bins lined the sidewalks and cars were parked in haphazard fashion up and down the road. A woman dragged a shopping trolley on wheels across a junction ahead, slowing the cabs, and a man worked under the raised hood of an old Buick. A lethargic air hung over the city as it waited for the sun to begin its descent into the west.
“We can check for movements,” Crouch said, “aliases. But remember, Jensen sees himself as a pirate captain. Wouldn’t he escape using the sea?”
Alicia shrugged. “You can’t count on a madman acting predictably.”
“Good point,” Russo said from the front seat. “We could spin around and put a watch on the museum.”
“How many ways could he get in?” Alicia wondered.
“Normal routes,” Crouch said. “Smugglers’ routes. We can’t watch them all.”
“But wait,” Caitlyn’s low voice stopped their speculations in their tracks, “there is another possibility.”
Crouch nodded. “Yes, I know.”
“Anyone care to inform us?” Russo asked.
Caitlyn was already speaking. “Jensen already knows where the island is,” she said. “And sent us off with an authentic clue to get us out of the way. Remember, he actually did my research for me.”
“Knowing,” Crouch added, “that we would eventually find the location and head straight for the island. It’s a tactic I should have foreseen.”
“Where he’ll be waiting?” Alicia asked, a tad hopefully.
“Either that, or long gone. Pawing through his ill-gotten gains.”
The team reflected for a few minutes before Crouch made the decision. “We’ll inform the local cops,” he said. “Put them on the museum and the access routes. We need to find that island.”
“Not to mention the treasure,” Russo said.
“No.” Alicia glanced at their driver. “You’re right. Only a knob-end would mention that.”
“But where to now?” Healey asked. “Back to Panama? Jamaica?”
“Our goal remains the same,” Crouch said. “We find a man that knows that island. The passage said look between Haiti, Panama and Port Royal. I think Jamaica would be the perfect place to ask around.”
Alicia thought the plan had merit. Judging by the satnav, they were starting to get close to the airport now, though it was screened behind a row of houses and tall trees to their right. They passed a driveway inhabited only by a speedboat, and a white house built on stilts so a fleet of cars could be parked easily in the shade underneath.
Ahead a black SUV approached.
Alicia squinted toward the blacked-out interior. “You see that?”
Crouch spoke into the cellphone. “Healey? How are we back there?”
“Black SUV just pulled out of a side street. Approaching fast.”
“Shit.”
Alicia told the driver to put his foot down just as the man started to slow. The SUV swerved into their path. Russo leaned over and wrenched the wheel out of his hands. “Get down.”